Thank you, Mr. Speaker. During the last sitting of the Legislature, I did a Member’s statement on health care card renewal. Many weeks have gone by, and I have to tell you that this has turned into an almost fulltime job for us in our constituency offices to deal with the myriad of people who cannot seemingly get a quick response to getting their health care cards renewed. I’ve checked with some of my other colleagues and Hay River is not alone. At first I wondered if it was a conspiracy.
It gives me no pleasure to stand up here and complain, as you know. We must always express all the things we’re thankful for. I am thankful for our health care system. I am thankful for those cards we have. I am thankful that we can hand them to any place in Canada and they will take care of us. I am thankful that we pay no premium, but you would think that issuing new health care cards on a new program that coincides with people’s birthdates would not have been this difficult.
Let me give you a few examples. I had a constituent that showed up for a medical procedure in Yellowknife three days before her birthday when
her card expired, only to be told by the health care professional that she, in fact, had to pay for the service and then she would get reimbursed later. Her health care hadn’t even expired yet and they were telling her this. Where is the communication with the people on the front line that are telling health care professionals what to say? Somebody’s got to be in charge of this.
I had a senior constituent in the south who had a $1,500 bill and was told just pay it and you’ll get reimbursed. Well, I have a news flash: Most people don’t have $1,500 sitting in their back account to pay for a health bill when they’re not expecting it. Most people don’t have that. A lot of people don’t have that kind of money, and health care procedures can be extremely expensive. Now, through a lot of phone calls and a lot of wrangling and stuff being faxed and phone calls back and forth, that situation was resolved, but that is a real life example.
I had a husband and wife in Hay River that both sent their applications out for renewal at the same time. The husband got his card back; the wife didn’t.
We have pharmacists in Hay River that are actually bankrolling, are carrying the costs of medication for people whose health care cards have not come in and, out of the goodness of their heart, are financing the pharmaceutical for the client. That’s not their job. We should not be asking them to do that.
I’ve heard rumors that maybe they lost some of the data in Inuvik. I don’t know about that, but I did make the same statement several weeks ago.
I will have questions again today to the Minister of Health and Social Services on the process for health care card renewal. Thank you.