The Last Samurai, a free-for-all and our canaries in the mine
'The whole system is breaking us' –BC nurse
Hello subscribers and refined guests to the page,
A Friday note to update you on some of our latest stories, along with a few notable news items from around BC.
First up, a couple of investigative stories we published lately that have been widely read, generated follow-up coverage by other news outlets, and spurred action from the province.
The patients are in charge
The first deep dive revealed the “free-for-all, out-of-control” environment at Dufferin Place nursing home in Nanaimo, where the province has been housing younger patients with severe addictions and mental health issues in a ‘special population unit.’ Nurse Lana Lekopoy told Northern Beat long-term care staff are bullied, harassed, threatened, and even sexual assaulted by erratic drug-addicted patients who come and go as they please and entertain drug user and drug-dealer visitors at all hours.
“The language, sexual assault, the physical aggression, the weapons, I mean, it finally breaks us. The whole system is breaking us.”
Lekopoy said the health authority employer and union have turned a blind eye, while patients can pretty much do what they want with few restraints.
“They are absolutely dominating us,” she said.
Tip of the iceberg
Unfortunately, Dufferin Place is not an isolated situation. The practice of streaming people with crippling addictions into elderly care homes has been going on for a while. Both Health Minister Adrian Dix and Premier David Eby initially deflected when asked if it was a deliberate provincial strategy, saying younger people with mental health and addictions have always been housed with long-term care.
True enough. But those younger patients weren’t in active addiction and prone to psychotic episodes while being enabled to continue using the drugs causing the violent outbursts and unruly behaviour. Comparing the surge of today’s younger patients – some diverted directly from encampments, homeless shelters and hospital wards – with the old days’ trickle of a few individuals addicted to alcohol and heroin is misdirection at best.
And you don’t have to be the health minister to see the number of individuals destabilized by hard drugs today has skyrocketed and the severity of their addictions has reached hellacious levels compared to the yesteryears recalled by Dix and Eby.
Nevermind how dangerous it is – negligent, even – streaming them into long-term care without specialized addictions treatment, then expecting staff who were trained to bathe and care for the elderly infirm to somehow meet the needs of a meth or fentanyl-addicted 35-year-old who needs to do drugs several times a day, has bruising mood swings and is newly arrived from a lawless life on the street.
These most troubled British Columbians need careful, specialized, humane treatment and safe place to live, but that shouldn’t take place in same care homes as frail elderly residents.
Canaries in the coal mine
Our nurses are harbingers of the catastrophe decimating our healthcare front lines. We ignore them and risk their safety at our own peril.
In my follow up investigation published this week, BC healthcare system demands silence over safety, I discovered an astounding deficiency in the system – front-line staff are expected to work in unsafe conditions and they’re supposed to keep their mouths closed while they’re doing it
Health authorities have a process for employees to report incidents and issues that jeopardize patient or staff safety. With the staffing shortages, the complex and chaotic behaviours of today’s patients, the illicit drug use on and around facilities, and the inadequate staff training for all of the above, many nurses are unable to meet professional care and practice standards. When they report troubling incidents and issues, some nurses have found themselves shunned, reprimanded or even reported to the college.
Instead of delving into the factors that caused a sub-standard care situation, the system turns against the one reporting the problem and the nurse can suddenly finds him/herself being investigated.
“There isn’t a culture of safety. Nobody is thanked for bringing a concern forward,” BC Nurses Union president Adrian Gear said in an interview for the story.
The admission is jaw-dropping. How can healthcare not have safety front-and-centre? It’s about health and care. Even the construction industry has a health and safety culture. The healthcare industry should be leading other sectors in health and safety practices. Sadly, in BC, it is not.
Sobering stats
WorkSafe BC accepted 5,500 “act of violence” claims from acute care and long-term care staff from 2019 through 2023. That doesn’t include claims for bullying and harassment. A recent survey by the BC Nurses Union revealed a majority of nurse respondents are exposed to illicit substances, violence and verbal or emotional abuse every month; about 40 per cent are exposed to weapons and almost all are working short-staffed. Upwards of 35 per cent of nurses surveyed said they were considering leaving healthcare or had already begun making plans to do so.
“It blows my mind that employers are not doing a better job at keeping nurses safe,” said Gear.
Instead of being safe, nurses feel unsupported by their union and health authority employers and they are burning out trying to provide the care they are duty-bond to deliver. The situation in some health facilities is so dysfunctional, standards regularly can’t be met. This is causing some nurses to spiral into a state of moral distress, until they eventually break down and break ranks to leave the system altogether.
One bright note
Eby gets some credit along with his staff (nod to Jimmy), for making time allay Lekopoy’s fear she’ll be fired or have her nursing licence pulled for speaking out.
Eby was adamant the nurse is protected from retribution by provincial whistleblowing legislation and her union’s collective agreement. “The public has a right to know and it’s also helpful for me to hear concerns from frontline healthcare workers… and they shouldn’t face retaliation for it,” the Premier said.
Lekopoy wasn’t completely reassured, however, “It’s nice to have that in writing,” she said.
The Last Samurai
The big political story this week was the dramatic last-ditch effort to unite the right by BC United Leader Kevin Falcon when he “fell on the sword,” withdrew his party from the election race and endorsed the provincial Conservatives.
Unfortunately, Falcon impaled many of his party’s election candidates in the process.
While the BC Conservatives hailed his courage for sacrificing BC United for the good of the province, Falcon’s own candidates seemed uniformly stunned, using words like “blindsided” and “betrayed.” For a glimpse behind the curtain at the intrigue and secret negotiations that led to the merger, read Rob Shaw’s column in BIV.
Of the 47 new candidates and 10 incumbent MLAs that had been running under the BC United banner, only seven of the former and three of the latter were invited to join the Conservative roster. To find out who’s still standing, try Alec Lazenby’s overview in the Vancouver Sun. Whether Rustad and his team seized this opportunity to cull the weakest candidates from their ranks remains to be seen.
Vaughn Palmer sees shades of upcoming NDP campaign messaging in Eby’s pivot following Falcon’s capitulation. And Todd Corrigall recounts the human losses in Prince George this week.
Vending machines in la-la land
Former NDP MLA-turned-Conservative candidate Gwen O’Mahony lodged a political spear deep into the NDP health policy flank, forcing another intervention by Premier Eby. In a short, simple video posted online that has now been seen almost 1 million times, O’Mahony introduces viewers to Island Health’s great idea of providing free crack pipes and meth snorting kits in a public vending machine outside Nanaimo’s hospital.
Two similar vending machines were also installed in Campbell River and Victoria late last year. According to an Island Health employee who spoke to me on condition of anonymity, ER staff asked for the one at Victoria General Hospital to be removed because drug users kept taking all the pipes (a saleable commodity) and harassing ER staff for more. Another source said the Campbell River machine has also been removed.
Eby had previously ordered a review after catching heat for an online health authority-run service that offered free home delivery of “harm reduction” paraphernalia similar to what was available in the vending machines. Shortly after O’Mahony’s video spread like a grass fire across social media, the Premier ordered a review of the vending machine initiative as well.
Adam Zivo from the National Post has an interesting take on the politics and policy behind both initiatives.
Quote of the week
Before Falcon cut a deal with the BC Conservatives, BC United MLA Coralee Oakes planned on going out swinging.
“I've got nothing to lose. It's going to be a bumpy election, and so, for all of us as MLAs, this is your time, like, if we're going out, I'm going out right, making sure people have a very clear understanding of what's going on.”
True to her word, Oakes stood up for nurses too scared to speak for themselves in this week’s investigation: BC healthcare system demands silence over safety.
Still on healthcare…
Caitlyn Coombes at energeticcity.ca in Fort St. John crunches the numbers on hospital “service interruptions” (Northern Health lingo) and discovers Northern BC communities had a staggering 107 ER closures in August alone.
Maybe for September, Coombes should save time and just track the hospitals that didn’t close. Were there any? And what are the ER closure stats elsewhere in the province?
Health authorities under scrutiny
Last week, Tyler Olsen at Fraser Valley Current revealed some health authority directors gave themselves a substantial fee increase and now make $1,400 to $2,000 a day for attending meetings.
When you consider how top heavy the health authority administrations are, the coins really start to add up.
That’s not all.
“Board chairs of BC’s six health authorities saw their compensation rise by more than 50 per cent in 2023/24 fiscal year,” according to Olsen.
Meanwhile, Tania Finch reported on the longstanding discontent voiced by Peace Country’s northeastern mayors who said health authorities are out-of-touch and not responsive to the citizens they are supposed to serve. Among other things, the mayors have asked for a full forensic audit of Northern Health services to understand where the money is going.
Thanks to Tyler, we know where a chunk of it has gone. With all the staff shortages and ER closures in their communities, it’s unlikely the mayors will think a 50 per cent pay hike for the chairs was money well spent.
Whack-a-Mole ‘til your arms fall off
Last story is from Jeff Davies. Wildfire of rumours explores the challenge of extinguishing conspiracies and the arduous task of fire hosing people with the truth when the forests are burning.
Spoiler: politically motivated arson is the current reigning champ on the wildfire conspiracy circuit.
Jilly Laviolette is an administrator of the volunteer citizen-run BC Wildfire Updates, Resources and Photos Page, a Facebook site that beats back the flames of conspiracy, and delivers imperative information that’s accurate. So when peoples’ lives are in danger and they reach for information, it’s the truth.
Battling conspiracies can be exhausting.
“It’s like playing Whack-A-Mole. One person pops up and we get them settled down. Then the next person will pop up, and oh my, the misinformation online spreads, I swear, faster than facts,” says Laviolette.
The good news is the group has 55,000 followers, so truth on the fire lines might prevail.
Election coverage begins soon
The provincial writ drops on Sept 21 so our coverage will soon be overrun with election news. Stay tuned to NorthernBeat.ca and this scintillating newsletter site for highlights, lowlights and the scandals in between. We’ll be keeping our eyes peeled (as my dad used to say) on candidate goings on as they campaign their way around the province.
UBCM’s 2024 escapade
Before the election race officially begins, BC mayors and councillors will gather for the Union of BC Municipalities annual conference in Vancouver Sept 16 to 20. That’s cutting it close UBCM! No excuses cabinet ministers – you’re supposed to be representing government until writ day – so you better all be at UBCM 24 to meet with municipalities (we’ll be taking attendance).
A bit of background for readers unfamiliar with UBCM. It’s an exceptional hotbed opportunity for knowledge-gathering. All BC’s municipal leaders converge on one place and talk about the most important challenges their communities are facing.
If you think of every community as a part of BC’s body, attending UBCM is like taking the province’s pulse.
After four days interviewing dozens of leaders, we should know better than the polls who British Columbians are going to elect on Oct. 19.
Predictions will follow.
All to say, there’s lots going on at Northern Beat.
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Thanks for reading and talk to you soon,
Fran
Questions, comments, story leads: Fran@NorthernBeat.ca
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