July 20th, 2020
Doug Ford has only built 34 new long-term care beds
QUEEN’S PARK — Doug Ford and his Conservative government have built a paltry 34 long-term care beds.
According to the government’s own long-term care systems report, the number of beds increased to just 78,800 in January 2020, up from 78,766 in July 2018. Ford and his ministers travelled the province over the last two years to hold press conferences to announce bed allocations – but they were re-announcements of beds allocated by the previous Liberal government, and never built by either.
“A senior can’t live in a press conference. They won’t be cared for by an announcement,” said NDP and Official Opposition Leader Andrea Horwath. “We’ve had government after government shovel money over to private for-profit long-term care corporations, at the expense of making any progress on building beds, and at the expense of people’s quality of living and quality of care.”
As of January 2020, the wait list for people waiting to get into a long-term care home had 37,612 names on it.
Last week, the government admitted it would not keep its promise of building 15,000 beds – which, itself, is a fraction of what’s needed.
