MEDIA ADVISORY: Sault Ste. Marie area elderly deprived of access to essential health care is a violation of human rights say groups calling for Commission inquiry

SAULT STE. MARIE, ON –/COMMUNITYWIRE/– As part of their call for Ontario’s Human Rights Commission to conduct a ground-breaking human rights inquiry into systemic discrimination based on age against the elderly in the provision of hospital and long-term care the Ontario Health Coalition (OHC), the Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU) of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), the Advocacy Centre for Elderly (ACE) on Monday, March 22 will release local Sault Ste. Marie health system numbers showing why the inquiry is needed.

Across Ontario nearly 4,000 long-term care residents died of COVID-19 – many of them with inadequate care and never given the option to go to hospital as they were ill and dying after contracting the virus.

The Sault Area Hospital is often overcapacity. Long-standing ‘de-hospitalization’ and rationing of hospital and long-term care are health policies that disproportionately hurt the elderly and must be challenged, say OHC, OCHU/CUPE and ACE.

WHO:

• Natalie Mehra, Director, Ontario Health Coalition (OHC)
• Michael Hurley, President, Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU/CUPE)
• Jane Meadus, Staff Lawyer and Institutional Advocate, Advocacy Centre for the Elderly (ACE)
• Adriel Weaver, Lawyer, Goldblatt Partners

WHAT:

• Media conference to review Sault Ste. Marie wait-times for long-term care, hospital overcrowding and patient offloading to underscore why a Human Rights Commission public inquiry under the Human Rights Code to investigate systemic discrimination based on age against the elderly in the provision of hospital and long-term care in Ontario is needed.

WHERE:

• http://bit.ly/OHRC-systemic-discrimination

WHEN:

• Monday, March 22, 2021, 11 a.m.

The Ontario Health Coalition (OHC) represents more than half a million people and 400 organizations dedicated to protecting and improving public health care in the public interest. OCHU is the hospital division of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) in Ontario. CUPE represents nearly 50,000 hospital workers across Ontario and another 40,000 health care staff working in long-term care and community settings. The Advocacy Centre for the Elderly is a community based legal clinic for low-income senior citizens.  ACE is the first legal clinic in Canada to specialize in the legal problems of seniors.

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For more information please contact: 

Stella Yeadon, CUPE Communications 416-559-9300  syeadon@cupe.ca