Isabelle Porter in Quebec
Published yesterday at 1:55 p.m. Updated yesterday at 10:58 p.m.
- Quebec
The Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, “considers it unacceptable” that a newborn baby was moved by plane from Baie-Comeau to Quebec without its mother and questions the relevance of this transfer.
“These [are] situations which are unacceptable,” reacted the minister on Tuesday. During the question period, he said he had asked the CISSS de la Côte-Nord if, “exactly, it was the right decision that was taken.”
The minister was responding to the Parti Québécois, which was outraged that the health situation on the North Shore had been allowed to deteriorate to the point where a newborn had to be transferred by plane from Baie- Comeau in Quebec without being accompanied by his mother. Calling himself “revolted,” PQ MP Joël Arseneau declared that the situation was “absolutely aberrant and inhumane.”
“We cannot accept that, in our regions, we cannot give birth, have the necessary care, when we are Quebecers who have paid for a universal health system that is free and accessible throughout the region. That’s the base,” said the MP for Îles-de-la-Madeleine.
On Saturday, the team at Le Royer hospital, in Baie-Comeau, had to transfer a baby by plane to Quebec without his mother, just after his birth, because he needed respiratory support for a few hours and the local nursery was closed.
Promise of reinforcements
Tuesday, Minister Dubé said that the new public flying team would be dispatched to the North Shore as quickly as possible. “There is a team that is being put in place at the moment to be able to open the positions in the coming days,” he said.
The situation is critical on the North Shore and in Abitibi-Témiscamingue since the entry into force of new Quebec regulations on the use of labor from employment agencies staff. To reduce the use of this independent workforce, Quebec has decided to cap the salary and the number of hours of weekly work that can be allocated to them.