If you listened to the “experts” on TV hourly and appearing in the pages of newspapers, you might think the hospital system is bulging with COVID-19 patients.
Thoughts of hallway healthcare already in our minds might lead any rational person to think COVID patients are lining the corridors in the province’s biggest hospitals.
We should be thankful that’s not the case, despite how even some of those at the hospitals may make it sound. Over the weekend, spokespeople for the biggest hospitals in Toronto said they were at a tipping point.
“We are either at 100% capacity now or over that with admitted patients in the Emergency Department,” said Gillian Howard Sunday, spokesperson for the University Health Network.
UHN includes Toronto General, Toronto Western Hospital and Princess Margaret Hospital plus Toronto Rehab and the Michner Institute. Across their entire system, there are 15 COVID patients and fewer than 10 of them are in ICU.
Is that a crisis?
Can 15 patients swamp Ontario’s biggest hospital, including Toronto General which proudly boasts that Newsweek ranked them one of the ten best hospitals in the world last year?
If that’s all it takes, then it’s a sad statement on UHN.
Yet doctor after doctor, even the Ontario Hospital Association, have claimed they are at a tipping point province-wide, despite just 500 patients in a system designed for 14.7 million people.
One particularly sour doctor is Michael Warner, head of critical care at Michael Garron Hospital in Toronto’s east end. He’s always got time to speak to the media or criticize the government as being inadequate in their response on social media.
His hospital’s website says they have seven patients with COVID-19. That’s right, seven. As in one above six.
Dr. Warner has been critical of the government’s response at every turn despite being wrong time and again like his wild claims about back to school being a disaster.
It’s not that there aren’t hospitals dealing with issues, William Osler in Brampton does have dozens of COVID-19 patients — but that’s the rarity.
St. Michael’s in downtown Toronto has eight patients, St. Joseph’s in the West End has eight, and in all of Ottawa, a city of 1 million people, there are 46 patients across four main hospitals.
For this, Warner and his ilk want the province locked down, Australia style, which would basically mean months of house arrest. The goal is no longer to flatten or bend the curve but to get to zero cases.
The reality is that Ontario is doing well compared to other jurisdictions across North America in dealing with COVID-19 despite what the naysayers claim.
Across the country, Ontario has the lowest rate of active cases per 100,000 of population outside of the Atlantic bubble. The province’s 85 cases per 100,000 is well below Manitoba’s 490 cases, Alberta’s 243, Saskatchewan’s 154, Quebec’s 146 and BC’s 114.
On the most serious of measurements, death from COVID, Ontario fares better than other comparable jurisdictions across North America. Compare Ontario’s 23 deaths per 100,000 to Quebec’s 77, Pennsylvania’s 72, Michigan’s 78, Illinois’ 82 or New York’s 134.
These are the states with similar populations to Ontario. Comparatively speaking, the province is doing well within the North American context.
Yes, there are things to criticize, there are things to improve upon, and I will continue to be a critic of the Ford government when they deserve it.
Yet in the middle of a pandemic that the entire world is dealing with, these doctors who all seem to think they should be the ones in charge, are complaining at dealing with seven and eight COVID patients in their hospital but want to run the whole province.
I’ll take a pass at letting Warner near the levers of power; he’s dangerous enough on Twitter.
If you listened to the “experts” on TV hourly and appearing in the pages of newspapers, you might think the hospital system is bulging with COVID-19 patients.
torontosun.com
