Alberta
Massive funding boosts kick off Alberta’s transition to fully comprehensive care
Dr. Paul Parks, president, Alberta Medical Association
Canada signs more than $1 billion bilateral agreement with Alberta to improve health care over three years
From: Health Canada
This investment will increase access to a primary health provider, reduce wait times for mental health services, and provide greater access to health data.
Canadians want and deserve a health care system that provides timely access to health services whenever and wherever they are needed. That is why the Government of Canada is investing over $200 billion over 10 years, which includes $25 billion for tailored bilateral agreements with provinces and territories, to support the Working Together to Improve Health Care for Canadians plan.
Today, the Honourable Mark Holland, Canada’s Minister of Health, and the Honourable Adriana LaGrange, Alberta Minister of Health, announced a bilateral agreement to invest $1.06 billion over the next three years, marking a crucial step in a 10-year plan for collaboration. This includes $285 million per year in new funding by the Government of Canada and continuing $70 million per year in previously-announced mental health and substance use funding, which will help accelerate efforts already underway in Alberta to improve health care access and services.
Through this federal funding, Alberta has a three year action plan to deliver improvements to its health care system by 2026, including:
- Increasing access to primary care providers for Albertans and reducing emergency department visits that could have been addressed by a family medicine office. This will be achieved by expanding team-based care and enhancing virtual care, and increasing the number of appointments available to patients.
- Funding community providers to increase diagnostic imaging capacity in the province, reducing wait times for CT scans and MRIs.
- Improving patient care by enhancing Albertans’ ability to access digital health services and their own health information by implementing e-referral services and accelerating the secure exchange of data across the health system.
- Expanding integrated services for youth mental health services in the province through school-based and community day programs, and offering more supports for youth with complex needs as they transition into adult services.
- Reducing median wait times for community mental health and substance use services by establishing new and improving existing treatment spaces, along with prioritizing culturally appropriate Indigenous community supports.
- Ensuring that First Nations and Métis people have access to high-quality, culturally safe care that meets their unique health needs. This will be achieved through dedicated funding for initiatives to enhance access to primary care in Indigenous communities, and funding for communities to develop health workforce capacity and infrastructure to improve the collection and use of health information and data.
- Improving access to health care for underserved Albertans, including through expanded community pilots that bring testing services to rural, remote and Indigenous communities, advancing French-language health services, and greater clinical care for women.
Progress on these initiatives and broader commitments will be measured against targets which Alberta will publicly report on annually.
Through this new agreement, Alberta will improve how health information is collected, shared, used and reported to Canadians; streamline foreign credential recognition for internationally educated health professionals; facilitate the mobility of key health professionals within Canada; and fulfill shared responsibilities to uphold the Canada Health Act to protect Canadians’ access to health care that is based on need, not the ability to pay.
Recognizing the significant disparities in Indigenous health outcomes, the Government of Canada and the Government of Alberta also commit to meaningfully engage and work together with Indigenous partners to support improved access to quality and culturally appropriate health care services. Alberta’s action plan is informed by continued engagement with its Indigenous partners and recent discussions involving the federal government. All orders of government will approach health decisions in their respective jurisdictions through a lens that promotes respect and reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples.
Alberta and the federal government will continue working together to improve access to health services and deliver tangible results to all residents across the province, including responding to the needs of Indigenous and other underserved and disadvantaged populations.
Quotes
“Our government is working together with provinces and territories to get Canadians the healthcare they need. This agreement is an important step in our collaboration with Alberta to take measurable actions to transform our health care system. The funding will help improve access to primary care and create better mental health services in Alberta. Together, we will continue working to achieve better health outcomes for all Canadians.”
The Honourable Mark Holland
Minister of Health of Canada
“Mental health is health, and through this agreement, we will be working with Alberta to integrate mental health and substance use care as a full and equal part of our universal health care system. This agreement will strengthen the capacity of family health providers, reduce substance use harms, and expand virtual care for youth to improve access to quality and timely mental health care and substance use supports. Together, we must ensure that all Canadians have access to supports and services for their mental health and well-being – when they need them, wherever they need them.”
The Honourable Ya’ara Saks
Minister of Mental Health and Addictions and Associate Minister of Health of Canada
“Alberta’s government is taking a serious look at the way health care is being delivered in our province. This is why we are refocusing our health care system to ensure Albertans have access to timely care, when and where they need it. This initial funding from the federal government is a good start and will support our shared health priorities of expanding access to primary care across the province and especially in our Indigenous communities, supporting our health care workers, improving access to quality mental health, and modernizing our health systems.”
The Honourable Adriana LaGrange
Minister of Health of Alberta
“Alberta’s government is supporting Albertans to improve their mental health and recover from the deadly disease of addiction as we build out the Alberta Recovery Model and refocus our provincial healthcare system. We are doing this by increasing access to CASA Mental Health Classrooms across the province, building more bed based mental health treatment capacity for youth, and improving access to mental health and addiction treatment services in communities. This initial funding from the federal government will offer some support to these made in Alberta initiatives as we build a better system of mental health and addiction care for Albertans.”
The Honourable Dan Williams
Minister of Mental Health and Addiction of Alberta
Quick facts
- The Working Together investment includes $25 billion for tailored bilateral agreements with provinces and territories, a guaranteed 5% Canada Health Transfer (CHT) increase for the next five years—amounting to $17.5 billion—and a one time CHT $2 billion top-up to address urgent needs of emergency rooms and paediatric hospitals delivered in June 2023. Combined, these investments provide provinces and territories the flexibility to address the unique needs of their populations and geography, and accelerate health care system improvements.
- Budget 2023 outlined the Government of Canada’s plan to invest over $200 billion over 10 years, including $46.2 billion in new funding for provinces and territories, to improve health care for Canadians. Within this funding, $25 billion is allocated through tailored bilateral agreements to address the unique needs of their populations and geography in four shared health priorities:
- expanding access to family health services, including in rural and remote areas;
- supporting health workers and reducing backlogs;
- increasing mental health and substance use support; and
- modernizing health care systems with health data and digital tools.
- All provinces and territories are already making considerable investments to advance progress in all four of these priority areas, and the new federal funding is complementing and expanding those efforts.
- As part of these bilateral agreements, provinces and territories are developing action plans that outline how funds will be spent and how progress will be measured to demonstrate to Canadians that improvements are occurring in Canada’s health care system. Alberta’s initial 3-year Action Plan can be found here.
- Budget 2017 committed $11 billion over 10 years in federal funding to provinces and territories to improve access to home and community care, and mental health and addictions services for Canadians. Bilateral agreements were signed with provinces and territories to access the first six years of funding. The final four years of funding for mental health and addictions are included in the new Working Together bilateral agreements.
- The Government is also working with provinces and territories to implement a second bilateral agreement focused on helping Canadians age with dignity close to home, with access to home care or care in a safe long-term care facility. This agreement will include the remaining $2.4 billion over four years to improve access to home and community care from Budget 2017; and the $3 billion over five years for long-term care from Budget 2021 to apply standards of care in long-term care facilities and help support workforce stability.
———-
From the Province of Alberta
This funding will be an essential transitional step to ensure doctors can continue to provide this care as we rapidly transition to a funding model that supports fully comprehensive care.”
Dr. Paul Parks, president, Alberta Medical Association
New funding to stabilize primary health careStabilization funding is coming soon as Alberta’s government continues working to improve primary health care across the province.  The government is pulling out all the stops to stabilize, strengthen and improve Alberta’s primary health care system. Additional funding of $200 million over two years will improve access to family physicians and help ensure primary health care is available for every Albertan when and where they need it. This funding is enabled through the new Canada-Alberta Health Funding Agreement with the federal government. The agreement represents a total of approximately $1.1 billion in additional health care funding over three years for shared priorities.
Stabilization funding is an important transitional measure identified through work under the memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the minister of health and the Alberta Medical Association (AMA), signed earlier this fall. The AMA has been advocating for family physicians and rural generalists through its work under the MOU. Alberta’s government will continue to engage with the AMA as it works to develop a new, sustainable physician comprehensive care model, which will also dictate how this additional funding will be distributed. In addition to work between the government and the AMA, the Comprehensive Care Task Force will, in the new year, provide a first draft of recommendations that will include additional short-term stabilization actions to help family doctors continue to practise comprehensive care and bridge the gap until a new physician comprehensive care model is developed. These short-term actions will:
Alberta’s government is committed to finalizing a sustainable physician comprehensive care model that will address the concerns of family physicians and rural generalists and ensure Albertans can access the care they need.
Other recently announced supports for primary health care include:
Related information |
From LifeSiteNews
Alberta Conservative Premier Danielle Smith followed through on a promised bill banning so-called ‘top and bottom’ surgeries for minors.
Alberta Conservative Premier Danielle Smith made good on her promise to protect kids from extreme transgender ideology after introducing a bill banning so-called “top and bottom” surgeries for minors.
“It is so important that all youth can enter adulthood equipped to make adult decisions. In order to do that, we need to preserve their ability to make those decisions, and that’s what we’re doing,” Smith said in a press release.
“The changes we’re introducing are founded on compassion and science, both of which are vital for the development of youth throughout a time that can be difficult and confusing.”
Bill 26, the Health Statutes Amendment Act, 2024 “reflects the government’s commitment to build a health care system that responds to the changing needs of Albertans,” the government says.
The bill will amend the Health Act to “prohibit regulated health professionals from performing sex reassignment surgeries on minors.”
It will also ban the “use of puberty blockers and hormone therapies for the treatment of gender dysphoria or gender incongruence” to kids 15 and under “except for those who have already commenced treatment and would allow for minors aged 16 and 17 to choose to commence puberty blockers and hormone therapies for gender reassignment and affirmation purposes with parental, physician and psychologist approval.”
Alberta Minister of Health Adriana LaGrange, the bill’s sponsor, said the province’s legislative priorities include “implementing policy changes to continue our refocusing work, position our health care system to respond to pressures and public health emergencies, and to preserve choice for minors. These amendments reflect our dedication to ensuring our health care system meets the needs of every Albertan.”
Earlier this year, the United Conservative Party (UCP) provincial government under Smith announced she would introduce the strong pro-family legislation that strengthens parental rights, protecting kids from life-altering, so-called “top and bottom” surgeries as well as other extreme forms of transgender ideology.
With Smith’s UCP holding a majority in the provincial legislature, the passage of Bill 26 is almost certain.
About the proposed law, Smith said that her government believes it is “vitally important to preserve the time” kids have as a “youth.” She added that she believes this is so kids can “gain sufficient amount of knowledge, experience, and perspective so that you can fully understand who you are, who you want to be and what opportunities you may want to have as an adult before making permanent life-altering decisions related to your body.”
While Smith has done far more than predecessor Jason Kenney to satisfy social conservatives, she has been mostly soft on social issues such as abortion and has publicly expressed pro-LGBT views, telling Jordan Peterson that conservatives must embrace homosexual “couples” as “nuclear families.”
This weekend, thousands of UCP members will gather for the party’s annual general meeting, where Smith’s leadership will be voted on along with many other pro-freedom and family policy proposals from members. Smith is expected to pass her leadership review vote with a large majority.
Alberta
Alberta court upholds conviction of Pastor Artur Pawlowski for preaching at Freedom Convoy protest
From LifeSiteNews
Lawyers argued that Pastor Artur Pawlowski’s sermon was intended to encourage protesters to find a peaceful solution to the blockade, but the statement was characterized as a call for mischief.
An Alberta Court of Appeal ruled that Calgary Pastor Artur Pawlowski is guilty of mischief for his sermon at the Freedom Convoy-related border protest blockade in February 2022 in Coutts, Alberta.
On October 29, Alberta Court of Appeal Justice Gordon Krinke sentenced the pro-freedom pastor to 60 days in jail for “counselling mischief” by encouraging protesters to continue blocking Highway 4 to protest COVID mandates.
“A reasonable person would understand the appellant’s speech to be an active inducement of the illegal activity that was ongoing and that the appellant intended for his speech to be so understood,” the decision reads.
Pawlowski addressed a group of truckers and protesters blocking entrance into the U.S. state of Montana on February 3, the fifth day of the Freedom Convoy-styled protest. He encouraged the protesters to “hold the line” after they had reportedly made a deal with Royal Canadian Mounted Police to leave the border crossing and travel to Edmonton.
“The eyes of the world are fixed right here on you guys. You are the heroes,” Pawlowski said. “Don’t you dare go breaking the line.”
After Pawlowski’s sermon, the protesters remained at the border crossing for two additional weeks. While his lawyers argued that his speech was made to encourage protesters to find a peaceful solution to the blockade, the statement is being characterized as a call for mischief.
Days later, on February 8, Pawlowski was arrested – for the fifth time – by an undercover SWAT team just before he was slated to speak again to the Coutts protesters.
He was subsequently jailed for nearly three months for what he said was for speaking out against COVID mandates, the subject of all the Freedom Convoy-related protests.
In Krinke’s decision, he argued that Pawlowski’s sermon incited the continuation of the protest, saying, “The Charter does not provide justification to anybody who incites a third party to commit such crimes.”
However, defence lawyer Sarah Miller pointed out that that Pawlowski’s sermon was protected under freedom of speech, an argument that Krinke quickly dismissed.
“While the appellant is correct that peaceful, lawful and nonviolent communication is entitled to protection, blockading a highway is an inherently aggressive and potentially violent form of conduct, designed to intimidate and impede the movement of third parties,” he wrote.
Pawlowski was released after the verdict. He has already spent 78 days in jail before the trial.
Pawlowski is the first Albertan to be charged for violating the province’s Critical Infrastructure Defence Act (CIDA), which was put in place in 2020 under then-Premier Jason Kenney.
The CIDA, however, was not put in place due to COVID mandates but rather after anti-pipeline protesters blockaded key infrastructure points such as railway lines in Alberta a few years ago.
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