Staffing shortages have led to emergency room closures across B.C. And last week, a Lions Gate patient died after lying in the waiting room for two days.
An older woman died last week after lying on a stretcher for at least two days in a North Vancouver hospital waiting room. It’s another sign, health-care workers say, of the growing staff-shortage in B.C.’s overcrowded emergency rooms.
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Last weekend, hospital ERs in Clearwater, Port McNeill, Port Hardy, Oliver and Ashcroft closed temporarily due to staffing shortages. Global News reported that an Ashcroft woman died of a heart attack on Sunday while her local ER was closed and the nearest ambulance was a half-hour away.
This was preceded by several ERs closing temporarily in the spring, and in June Squamish maternity patients being redirected to Metro Vancouver hospitals for several days.
It’s a crisis that is not limited to B.C., but is unfolding across Canada.
