The Liberals’ bus says ‘11,000 individuals died ready for surgical procedure final 12 months,’ however Ontario Well being information obtained by The Trillium reveals the quantity is far smaller
EDITOR’S NOTE: This text initially appeared on The Trillium, a Village Media web site dedicated to protecting provincial politics at Queen’s Park.
On a crisp Saturday afternoon on Day 4 of the election marketing campaign, Liberal Chief Bonnie Crombie unveiled her occasion’s brilliant crimson marketing campaign bus in downtown Toronto.
Plastered throughout one facet of the bus — “11,000 people died waiting for surgery last year” — is a mark of the Liberals’ deal with well being care throughout this election marketing campaign. Knowledge obtained by The Trillium, nevertheless, tells a unique story.
Final 12 months, from January to November, 1,365 grownup Ontarians died whereas on a waitlist for surgical procedure, based on information from provincial company Ontario Well being. One other 26 kids and youth, aged 0 to 19, additionally died.
The 12 months earlier than, in 2023, there have been 1,584 adults and 33 youth who died.
One surgeon who spoke with The Trillium cautioned that even these smaller numbers shouldn’t be interpreted because the quantity of people that died as a result of they had been ready for surgical procedure. Many, he famous, had been ready for non-life–saving surgical procedures like cataract removals and knee surgical procedures and certain died of previous age or unrelated causes.
“Nobody is dying from their cataracts, like cataracts don’t explode, they don’t stop your heart, they don’t give you a stroke, they just cause visual impairment,” mentioned Dr. David Urbach, professor of surgical procedure on the College of Toronto and head of the Division of Surgical procedure at Ladies’s Faculty Hospital, who additionally acknowledged that there are issues with accessing care within the well being system.
Some, together with the hosts of the #onpoli TVO podcast, have famous the Liberals’ bus is harking back to a crimson bus that Boris Johnson, former prime minister of the UK and former London mayor, used as a part of the “Vote Leave” marketing campaign throughout the Brexit referendum in 2016.
“We send the EU £350 million a week. Let’s fund our NHS instead,” mentioned giant white letters throughout the facet of the bus, referring to the UK’s publicly funded health-care system.
The declare drew consideration, together with as a result of it was thought of inaccurate.
Again in Ontario, the Ontario Liberal Social gathering isn’t the one group that has used the “11,000 people” determine and referred to it because the quantity of people that have died whereas ready for surgical procedure.
A Jan. 31 information launch from CUPE’s Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU-CUPE) famous the union’s upcoming efforts throughout the election to attract consideration to the “crisis in Ontario’s health care.”
This included “250,000 people waiting for surgeries, 11,000 of whom died on the waitlist.”
Reached by cellphone on Wednesday, OCHU-CUPE president Michael Hurley acknowledged that quantity was incorrect.
“We’ve stopped using the number, and I guess we’ll have to apologize for using an incorrect number there,” mentioned Hurley, pointing to a Feb. 3 submit from SecondStreet.org, which describes itself as a assume tank that makes use of “storytelling as a way to discuss public policy issues.”
SecondStreet.org included in its submit information that it mentioned it obtained from Ontario Well being exhibiting 11,500 Ontarians died in 2022-23 whereas on surgical (2,096 individuals) or diagnostic scan (9,404 individuals) waitlists. Some information retailers reported on this information within the fall of 2023, noting that the entire referred to each surgical and diagnostic waitlists.
Hurley mentioned whereas the particular variety of individuals dying whereas on a surgical waitlist was incorrect, many Ontarians “are waiting beyond the recommended time limits for their procedure and the reality is … a fairly significant number of people are dying waiting for that surgery.”
He mentioned the essential query on this election marketing campaign is what events’ plans are to handle the surgical waitlist.
“So far, we have to hear about … plans to run operating rooms 24/7, to recruit in a meaningful way the nurses and doctors to be able to step up to handle increasing capacity in our hospitals to be able to meet the demand, which we currently aren’t meeting, and which in some cases, unfortunately, is having tragic consequences for individuals and their families,” Hurley mentioned.
Requested by The Trillium in regards to the Liberals’ bus at a marketing campaign cease in Scarborough on Thursday morning, the occasion’s chief, Crombie, spoke of the tens of millions who don’t have entry to a household physician and sufferers who’re being handled in hospital hallways.
“(Doug Ford) flippantly said one day if you wanted to get an MRI or a (CT) scan, you should go to a veterinary office. How offensive is that, that our doctors aren’t equipped, our hospitals aren’t equipped with the right equipment, right machines to provide care and analysis and testing for Ontarians?” she mentioned.
“So we stand by our statistics,” Crombie added.
“If there will be any change, we will get back to you, but our statistics hold,” she mentioned, calling up fellow candidate Adil Shamji, the incumbent operating once more in Don Valley East, who was additionally the occasion’s well being critic.
Shamji acknowledged the quantity was extra than simply surgical procedures, saying the statistic of round 11,000 individuals “dying on surgical and diagnostic imaging waitlists in 2023 has been widely recorded.”
“But my honest personal experience, and from what I’ve heard from colleagues, is, if anything, that’s the tip of the iceberg. There are far more. There are far more people who are suffering in other ways,” Shamji mentioned.
“The number of people who’ve died on waitlists is a shadow of the number of people who’ve suffered irreparable harm, who are struggling at home, who are unable to make ends meet, who are unable to pursue gainful employment because their basic fundamental health-care needs guaranteed under the Canada Health Act have not been met,” he mentioned.
After requesting the supply of the statistic the occasion used on its marketing campaign bus, a spokesperson despatched a number of information articles that included reference to the OCHU-CUPE’s declare, which the union has since mentioned was “incorrect,” and a information article from 2023 that famous the quantity included these ready for each surgical procedures and diagnostic scans.
The info The Trillium obtained for 2024, damaged down based on the kind of surgical procedure and up till the top of November, included 145 individuals on a waitlist for common surgical procedure, 75 individuals ready for vascular surgical procedure, 216 ready for orthopaedic surgical procedure and 484 individuals ready for ophthalmic surgical procedure.
It contains sufferers categorized as precedence degree 2 (pressing), 3 (semi-urgent) and 4 (elective) circumstances, however not precedence degree 1 emergency circumstances or palliative, reconstructive and diagnostic most cancers surgical procedures (therapy circumstances are included).
Whereas surgical waitlists and folks dying on them has trickled into the provincial election, some are recommending warning when attempting to make sense of such information.
The Trillium requested an interview with an Ontario Well being official, however as an alternative acquired an electronic mail with info, a few of which was already included within the paperwork with the info.
The company confused that the info on “cancellations of surgeries due to patient death must be interpreted with caution.”
“These surgical statistics do not indicate that patients passed away as a result of wait times. Mortality can be affected by many complex and interrelated factors unrelated to the surgery. For common surgeries like hip and knee replacement, or cataract, for example, surgery is not life-saving and outcomes are less time-sensitive,” the e-mail acknowledged.
Urbach, the professor of surgical procedure on the College of Toronto, echoed this.
“You really have to be careful about how to interpret it, and a lot of analysis would have to go in before you would make any conclusion about whether this reflected some really serious catastrophe in the health system,” mentioned Urbach.
He pointed to the quantity of people that died throughout the first 11 months of 2024 — 484 individuals — who had been on the waitlist for ophthalmic surgical procedure. Most of those, he mentioned, would doubtless be cataract surgical procedures.
“The numbers that you see are going to be a combination of the age of the people who are waiting for these procedures and the number of people who are waiting for these procedures,” he mentioned.
In the case of most cancers surgical procedures, Urbach mentioned it’s comparable the place he doesn’t assume individuals died as a result of they had been ready just a few further weeks, for instance.
“There are lots of people waiting for a surgery of one type or another, and they will just never get there, but it’s not something that earlier surgery would have done something about,” mentioned Urbach, who acknowledged that there could possibly be “isolated cases.”
“I’d be surprised that any percentage of the population is not on a waitlist for something when they die,” he mentioned.
Dr. Dominik Nowak, president of the Ontario Medical Affiliation, mentioned it’s tough to interpret the info as a result of “there are a number of other things that could happen” to people on a waitlist for care.
However he added that waits have “serious impacts” on individuals.
“As doctors, we all have stories of people who were on (waitlists) and in large part because of the longer waits, couldn’t get the care they needed and had serious impacts from that,” Nowak mentioned. “And whether that impact is a worsening condition or worsening cancer or worsening preventable disease or death, I think we all have stories like that in our practices, and especially more so in the last few years.”
—Knowledge visualization by Jessica Smith Cross
