Vaughn Palmer: Too many individuals dying on B.C.’s cancer-care wait lists

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VICTORIA — A Victoria girl, Samia Saikali, is identified with abdomen most cancers. She wants chemotherapy urgently however is relegated to a ready record.

Weeks later, when the therapy lastly begins, it’s too late. She writes birthday playing cards for her six grandchildren — for every of them, for annually till they flip 18 — and opts for medically assisted demise.

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She dies on June 22 of this yr, aged 67.

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One other Victoria resident, Dan Quayle, has an aggressive type of esophageal most cancers. He languishes for weeks in hospital for the chemo that by no means comes.

Lastly, when the ache is so nice he can’t eat, can’t stroll, he tells his life companion: “I simply can’t do it any extra” and opts for medically assisted demise.

She comforts him for one final time whereas he passes on Nov. 24. He’s simply 52.

Then there’s Saanich resident Allison Ducluzeau, stricken with a uncommon type of stomach most cancers. She opts for state-of-the-art therapy at a hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, therapy she was denied right here in B.C.

The 12 hours on the working desk prices her $205,000. She raises the cash by means of on-line fundraising and by cashing in an inheritance.

However the 57-year-old lives to inform the story, returning to work as a realtor and marrying her companion of 9 years on a seaside in Hawaii Nov. 14 together with her youngsters in attendance.

Campbell River resident Kristin Logan, 43, is taking a look at a wait of three to 4 months for therapy for Stage 4 ovarian most cancers right here in B.C. As a substitute, as a twin citizen and U.S. navy veteran, she is getting handled in Washington state.

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South Surrey resident Sheila Vicic has Stage 3 colon most cancers. Discouraged by the ready instances right here in B.C., she cashes in her retirement financial savings to cowl an anticipated price in extra of $10,000 U.S. for chemo at a clinic in Bellingham, Washington.

“What are my RRSPs price if I don’t reside by means of this?” says the 60-year-old mom of three.

These horror tales and others have been reported by numerous B.C. information retailers lately.

Katie DeRosa, who wrote up a number of instances for Postmedia, says that after every was revealed, she was contacted by others — sufferers, households, survivors — with comparable tales to inform.

Collectively these tales quantity to a stunning indictment of the state of most cancers care in B.C., one which the New Democrats are struggling to rationalize.

Well being Minister Adrian Dix is defending the federal government file with statistics, as he often does.

He notes the New Democrats have been sending tons of of sufferers to Bellingham for radiation remedy, masking all the prices. As for chemotherapy, 300 further sufferers are receiving therapy in B.C. this yr over final.

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The province has lately employed 61 new most cancers medical doctors, 28 new radiation therapists. The New Democrats have added nearly 40,000 well being care staff — medical doctors, nurses, caregivers of each sort — since taking workplace in 2017.

“We’re setting data nearly each week within the variety of surgical procedures we do within the well being care system,” Dix instructed Richard Zussman of International TV lately. “We’ve gone forward of many of the different provinces in these issues.”

However as even he admits: “I don’t suppose individuals care once they want surgical procedure what the ready instances are in New Brunswick. They care what they’re in Comox. They care what they’re in Campbell River. They care what they’re in Kelowna.”

Likewise with the minister’s exhausting briefings on the state of the well being care system. Dix has the statistics on his aspect. It’s the anecdotes which might be undermining his case.

The well being minister doesn’t touch upon particular person instances, a matter of coverage that’s nothing if not handy.

But it surely doesn’t take many tales about sufferers shelling out tens of hundreds of {dollars} of their very own cash for care within the U.S. — or tales about individuals selecting demise as a result of they’ll’t endure the ache of ready — to swamp the influence of all of the graphs and charts within the minister’s technical briefings.

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There’s something drastically incorrect with the state of most cancers care in B.C., as Premier David Eby has just about conceded of late.

“Any British Columbian that faces a most cancers prognosis, it’s most likely the scariest second they’re going to face of their lives,” he stated final week.

“They’ve a proper to anticipate that once they attain out to the health-care system, they’re going to get the help that they want.”

Too typically, he concedes, the help isn’t there.

“I’m not glad with the place we’re on most cancers care within the province.”

Earlier this month, Eby vowed that: “Any wait time for a person who’s dealing with a most cancers prognosis is unacceptable for them and their households and for me.”

Unacceptable? In what approach? It isn’t as if he’s firing anybody for these shortcomings or altering course on a course the New Democrats have been following for seven years.

The premier expects the general public to be affected person till outcomes enhance.

Within the meantime, some sufferers might be ready, struggling and, in a genuinely unacceptable variety of instances, dying.

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