IN THE LEDGE – ‘Will the premier remove funding uncertainty for Kamloops prenatal services?’

Comments by Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Todd Stone in the B.C. Legislature on Tuesday, March 12, 2024.

T. Stone: In the Kamloops area, expectant mothers are once again being subjected to the stress and the worry of not being able to access the prenatal care that they need.

The First Steps early pregnancy clinic, which sees well over 60 new pregnancies every month, is desperately trying to avoid running out of money, since this NDP government has only funded them to March 31.

Now this NDP-manufactured funding uncertainty is causing extreme stress for mothers like Jordyn Jeffrey, who is pregnant with her first child and desperate after her plea for obstetrics care was recently declined. She says: “I was told that I have to go to Salmon Arm or Vernon, which is crazy to me in a city of our size.”

My question is this. Will the Premier remove this funding uncertainty today so that there’s no disruption to the critical prenatal services that are desperately needed by hundreds of expectant mothers in Kamloops and surrounding communities?

Hon. A. Dix: The member will know, because we’ve been working on the issues around maternity care in Kamloops over the last year, that very significant supports and investments have been put in place, both for doctors, for nurses, for midwifery, and we’re going to continue to act to support expectant mothers in Kamloops.

The member has raised this issue with us, and we’re working hard to ensure that people of Kamloops get the care they deserve. We made very significant investments, the member will know, in increasing doctors and nurses and health care services in Kamloops, and we’re going to continue to do so.

The Speaker: Opposition House Leader, supplemental.

T. Stone: Well, Mr. Speaker, this funding issue is exactly what happened to a different obstetrics clinic one year ago in Kamloops, when the TRFO clinic also faced funding uncertainty that went on for months and months.

Fast forward to today — same issue, same minister, same robotic answer. Since the first steps early pregnancy clinic opened in September of 2023, nearly 400 expectant mothers from Kamloops and the surrounding communities have been able to receive the prenatal care that they need. This is all at risk for hundreds of expectant moms moving forward because the NDP government will not solve this funding issue today. The funding runs out in a little over two weeks from today.

I would remind the Minister of Health that in Kamloops, two in five Kamloopsians do not have a family doctor either. Now, this leaves expectant mothers like Tighe Morrow in the lurch. She lives in Vavenby, two hours north of Kamloops. She’s facing a breech pregnancy. She’s being told that her only options are a C-section or travelling down to Vancouver for up to five weeks.

Tighe says: “To not have the options and be really forced into a major surgery without having any alternatives is really scary. It really makes you think twice about where you’re living and the health care here.”

Why is the Premier denying expectant mothers like Ty the prenatal care that she deserves and that she should receive in Kamloops? Will the Premier today solve this funding issue for this critical obstetrics clinic in Kamloops?

Hon. A. Dix: What the government has done is take action, as we did last year, as we continue to do to bring more doctors, to bring more nurse practitioners, to bring more nurses, health sciences professionals, to add services in Kamloops and everywhere else. That’s what we’ll continue to do in this case.

Source: BC Hansard