Health care spending and where it’s directed have Wab Kinew, Manitoba’s NDP leader worried. 

 

While in Thompson last week, he spoke with Arctic Radio about how funding cuts made by the Progressive Conservative government a few years back lead to over-burdened, understaffed health care facilities during the pandemic.

 

Kinew said Thompson and the north has been hit particularly hard with staffing shortages.

 

“Here in Thompson, eleven million dollars was spent last year on Agency Nurses. That’s basically just a symptom of the fact that they don’t have the staff necessary to work here. We saw closures in communities like Leaf Rapids and Gilliam over the holidays and we’ve seen other signs of strain.”

 

Last year’s cost for agency nurses was double that of 2019.  

 

Kinew said he and the NDP want the province to provide a timetable for when and how they plan to tackle the backlog of surgeries and diagnostic tests.  

 

According to Kinew, that number is sitting at around 160-thousand procedures. 

 

For more, listen to Thompson Today this afternoon at 12:40 and 5:10.