If you are a senior or have a parent who is a senior it is especially important to understand what our provincial government is doing to our health care system. Carol Wodak, whose mother spent 11 years in the continuing care system before passing away in 2006, spearheads Citizen Watch - Continuing Care in Alberta. Wodak spoke at the Friends of Medicare AGM last Saturday at the Parkdale United Church in Calgary.

It was not until the 1950s that health care became a provincial responsibility. In response, the provincial government created publically funded chronic care hospitals and senior lodges. Public health care services for seniors peaked in the late 1970s. At that time, home care services would “bring you groceries, cook your meal, clean your home, shovel your sidewalk, take you to medical appointments, change your dressings, make sure you had and were taking your medications, and would make sure you were eating. They gave you drugs, and provided equipment and supplies,” says Wodak.

Things drastically changed in the 1990s. In 1994, the Alberta government decided that senior care was too expensive. They used the shock of the recession to start privatizing senior health care services. There was a lot of money to be made by privatizing public health care services during the so-called ‘Granny Boom’.

To convince citizens of the need for the privatization of seniors health care, the province needed to do a number of things. First they needed to change the ideology from we to me. Our government came up with a new vision of our health care system. The new vision was that people should be responsible for themselves, with charity caring for the deserving poor. By increasing the access to information, Albertans could make responsible choices.

As Wodak notes, “Nowhere in the government’s literature does it say that they have the responsibility to care for its citizens”. Instead our government implicitly says that seniors should receive care from family, friends, charity, and out of their own pocket.  

The second step was to decrease funding to our health care system. When you starve the public system, the quality of services deteriorates. When this happens private options start to look more appealing.

The government decreased the number of acute care hospital beds from 14,700 in 1994 to 6,300 in 1999. “In 2005, the Auditor General recommended that the government put $250 million into long term care to get those facilities up to minimum standards, but they only received $70 million. Yet in 2006 citizens received $400 Ralph Bucks, which cost $1.4 billion. In addition, the Alberta government reduced individual and corporate income taxes by $342 million. My taxes have never been reduced. Only businesses and those who have incomes above $120,000 have seen their taxes go down,” says Wodak.

The final step is increasing the price of health services. Under the Canada Health Act, hospital services are covered, so the provincial government transferred many services out of the hospital. This way the government can charge user fees – a disguised tax increase. For example, Wodak’s mother had to spend $3,500 for her wheelchair, something that used to covered by our Alberta Health Care.

It doesn't end there. “Now the province is raising the public insurance rates so that private insurance can compete,” says Wodak. What was once a universal service, the cost of pharmaceuticals is now based on your income, another hidden tax for middle class seniors.  

Instead of a hidden tax, the government is packaging these changes as increasing choice. Private retirement homes have happily provided this ‘choice’. They advertise “flexible lifestyle options by letting you choose what you can do for yourself. You can choose how you spend your time and who you spend it with. In the fine print at the bottom they say that some nursing services are provided and more can be purchased if necessary,” says Wodak. “Everyone likes choices, but what it means is that if you can’t pay for it you will do without and enhanced services really just mean you are going to get a bill in the end,” adds Wodak.

Private retirement homes are receiving grants to further ‘level the playing field’ to compete with the public sector. Private retirement homes either charge more or decrease their services to cash in on the ‘Granny Boom’. You definitely won’t find this on retirement home advertisements with images of happy seniors hula hooping, creating the image of youthfulness. Questions arise once you cut through the hoopla though. “What about those who are immobile, how do they get into long term care? They are put on a huge waiting list. When these people need help we are not there for them,” says Wodak.

Our health care system has gone from a charity based system to a public services system. Now we are transitioning to a private for profit system. Wodak points out that “once services become privatized the need for charity becomes greater. I believe that once the toothpaste is out of the tube we will never get it back”. Sadly our health care system for seniors is stepping backwards into the past and coming full circle.

As we have seen, the money for funding a health care system is there to meet the goal of maintaining and improving the functional independence and quality of life for seniors. Our government though is just choosing to give it to businesses so they can pay outrageous salaries and bonuses to their executives, instead of to seniors who are in need of quality health care.

If you are interested in making a difference join these groups:

Citizens Watch - Continuing Care in Alberta

Friends of Medicare

Public Interest Alberta