Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Like my colleagues, I rise today with great concern that the midwifery services have been temporarily suspended in Yellowknife effective May 6th . I
believe that this is an incredible disappointment to many families who want access to this excellent service that was being provided to mothers and newborns.
Over the past several years many MLAs, including myself, have been calling upon this government to expand the much needed services in our community, and now the Department of Health and Social Services is conducting a program review and expansion analysis to develop options for the territorial Midwifery Program. Mr. Speaker, all they had to do was just listen to MLAs to hear it was working.
Well, this is both a welcomed and disappointing surprise, Mr. Speaker, because at the same time we’ve been calling for the expansion, now they have to shut down and think about how they want to do it.
Mr. Speaker, there was only one person providing midwifery services here in Yellowknife and truthfully was working way beyond any person’s natural ability and capacity, while at the same time, sadly, they had to turn people away because the demand was so great and the need for this service has continued to grow.
As we all know very well, midwives in Canada are trained specialists who care for women throughout their pregnancy and birth, and further they offer aftercare services to mothers and babies for the first few weeks after that birth. Mr. Speaker, in my view, the midwives are a fundamental part of our health care team of our future in the Northwest Territories.
As I’ve said before, in Fort Smith there are two midwives providing these services, and I continue to hear rave reviews of the work and services they provide their community where resident physicians are sometimes difficult and hard to find. To add to that point, last year in my travels, I crossed paths with the National Midwifery Conference being held in Edmonton. The midwives from all across our nation who were taking part in that program discussing what they’re doing there had nothing but great things to say about the examples being done here in the Northwest Territories. More specifically, they commented about the great work being done in Fort Smith as a blueprint to the future success of midwifery in Canada.
Building upon that success in Yellowknife, there has been only one midwife for some time. It was a huge challenge, but clearly she was up to it. Now the local program has been suspended. If I can describe it this way: the program here in Yellowknife was a gleaming beacon of success with unprecedented support from the public, health care partners, mothers, families, and politicians like myself. With support like that, perhaps it was doomed from the beginning.
I will have questions for the Minister later today.