The City of Whitby is launching a public consciousness and letter-writing marketing campaign to stress the province to get transferring on a long-promised hospital.
The earlier provincial authorities first beneficial a brand new acute care hospital for Durham Area in 2015.
In 2022, an impartial panel recognized a 50-acre parcel of land in Whitby, close to Highways 412 and 407, as the popular web site for the regional well being centre.
“For 2 years we’ve got been affected person, however we merely cannot wait any longer,” Mayor Elizabeth Roy instructed reporters Wednesday.
Roy is urging the Ford authorities to commit $3 million to permit planning and design work to start, in addition to decide to the Whitby location.
The city is spreading its message by means of billboards, advertisements in physician’s places of work, on social media and in newspapers, and welcoming residents to ship notes to Premier Doug Ford by means of its web site.
By 2051, the city says the inhabitants of Durham Area is predicted to just about double to 1.3 million. With a possible hospital construct lasting a decade, Roy says the federal government must act now so as to add capability to a healthcare system already struggling to maintain up.
“(It is) new households having youngsters. It is youngsters who get sick. It is seniors who are also experiencing time and delay the place they’re sitting inside their emergencies within the hallways earlier than they’ll even get a mattress.”
Pickering Mayor Kevin Ashe agrees a Durham hospital is overdue however argues it ought to be hosted in his metropolis, the one Durham municipality and not using a hospital.
“We acknowledge that Whitby was beneficial by means of neighborhood session as the popular web site of the brand new Lakeridge Hospital,” Hannah Jensen, spokesperson for Ontario Well being Minister Sylvia Jones, writes in a press release.
“We’ll proceed to work carefully with Lakeridge Well being and different companions on the following spherical of planning grants for this undertaking to ship extra linked, handy care within the Durham Area for years to return.”
