Stretched to the Limit: Line-up of Gurneys at Queen’s Park as Hospital Staff Kick off 30-Town Tour to Highlight Health Care Crisis

OCHU-CUPE to hold media conference on the steps of Queen’s Park at 11am tomorrow

TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--On the eve of the provincial election, a line-up of stretchers outside Queen’s Park will symbolize the crisis in Ontario health care:

- 2.5 million citizens without a family doctor
- Palliative homecare patients dying without painkillers and medical supplies
- 250,000 people waiting for surgeries, 11,000 of whom died on the waitlist
- Nearly 50,000 people waiting for long-term care
- 1,860 people on stretchers in hospital hallways, up from 826 in June 2018 when the Premier promised to end hallway medicine
- Constant ER closures in small towns

The stretchers will travel to communities, large and small, spotlighting the crisis. They will visit the Thessalon and Minden hospital sites, where all acute care beds have been closed; Sudbury, which saw its hospital recently rejecting regional patient transfers as overcrowding reached 121 per cent; Walkerton, where 1,000 people lined up for a family doctor and 500 were turned away; Chesley and Durham and St. Mary’s, where ER closures are all too routine and big city hospitals like Hamilton Health Sciences, whose deficit has hit $112 million as it tries to meet the overwhelming demand from the community.

“The crisis in healthcare affects almost every family,” says Michael Hurley, president of CUPE’s Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU-CUPE). “The entire health care sector is staggering. There is no end to the staffing shortages; ER closures, waits for surgeries or for long-term care beds or for a family doctor or for appropriate home care services. We hope to help ensure that this election focuses on solutions to this crisis.”

Ontario hospitals had a cumulative deficit of $800 million

The union is raising concerns about access to care due to growing deficits across the hospital sector. Based on latest government data, hospitals in Ontario faced a cumulative deficit of $800 million in the first half of 2024-25.

Cuts are happening now in countless hospitals including Hamilton, Guelph, and Burlington as they buckle under the weight of growing patient volumes and insufficient funding.

Pointing out that per-person hospital funding in Ontario is the lowest in Canada and that we have the fewest beds and hospital staff to population, Hurley says it is not surprising to witness a record increase in hospital overcrowding.

About 2,000 patients every day receive care on stretchers in unconventional spaces such as hallways and storage closets, an increase of 140 per cent since June 2018 when Ford got elected on the promise to end hallway health care.

Hurley says hospital overcrowding compromises patient and staff safety, causing delays in admitting patients, higher risk of nosocomial infections, and heavier workloads. Moreover, it robs patients of dignity as they are treated out in hallways without privacy.

“There are 250,000 people on wait lists for surgeries and 11,000 of them died waiting last year” Hurley says. “2,000 are on stretchers today, begging for a bed. Palliative patients die at home without painkillers. As a province we must do so much better for our citizens.”

Who:	Michael Hurley, president of CUPE’s Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU- CUPE)
	Doug Allan, senior health care researcher at CUPE
What:	A line-up of hospital stretchers outside Queen’s Park to warn about the health care crisis in Ontario
Where:	Queen’s Park, 111 Wellesley St W, Toronto
When:	11am on Tuesday, January 28

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