[GTranslate]TORONTO – Hire thousands of personal support workers (PSW) and place infection control specialists in long-term care homes, – as has been done in Quebec – a system to allow hospitals to support the long-term care industry and to ensure seniors don’t have to share a room in three or four. These are some of the various proposals Ontario doctors have made to protect LTC residents but which the government has rejected “as too expensive.”

To point the finger at the Ministry of Health and that of Long Term Care are various doctors heard by the Long Term Care Commission that is examining the impact of Covid-19 on the province’s long-stay system. “Several proposals were made to the two ministries about what could be done and all were deemed too expensive,” said infectious disease specialist Allison McGeer, who was questioned on March 4 about the second wave of Covid in LTC that turned out to be even more lethal than the first. So far, about 1,900 residents of these facilities have died from the virus during the second wave.

Health officials are convinced that while Ontario was better prepared for the second wave, the province did not do enough because it mistakenly believed that the problems present in the first wave had been solved. “I don’t think we could have stopped the second wave, I think the problems were too big to be solved in that four-month period – said McGeer – but I think there were a number of measures that we chose not to implement because of the general belief was that everything would be fine in the second wave.”

Dr. Samir Sinha, head of the geriatrics department of the Sinai Health System and member of the University Health Network of Toronto is of the same opinion: “Staff were already a problem in this area before the pandemic, but it worsened after the first wave as much lost confidence in the system and quit their jobs – testified the member of the scientific advisory group of Sinha province before the Commission led by the Chief Associate Judge of the Supreme Court Frank Marrocco – this problem could have been adequately addressed during the summer.”

These are serious accusations, those made by McGeer and Sinha: the thought that the death of many people could have been avoided causes pain and anger in family members.

So far, 3,748 people have died from the virus in nursing homes.

She is increasingly convinced that the government has chosen to save money rather than save lives for NDP leader Andrea Horwath. “The options were ignored – said Ms. Horwath – so the premier let people die in nursing homes and families mourn the loss of their loved ones in order not to spend money. Why didn’t he save those elders’ lives?”

The NDP and McGeer’s belief that the government rejected the proposals because of their cost is “completely inaccurate and misleading” according to LTC Minister Merrilee Fullerton. “There has been no saving of money to protect long-term care residents,” Fullerton said.

The Long Term Care Commission is due to submit the report to the provincial government on April 30.