The Saskatchewan NDP is addressing the overcrowding that occurred at both Royal University and St. Paul’s Hospital on Wednesday, leaving patients no choice but to receive treatment in waiting rooms and hallways. 

NDP Health Critic Vicki Mowat says as of Wednesday afternoon, there were 93 patients in the emergency room at RUH, which is designed to hold 45 people. At St. Paul’s, there were 53 patients in an emergency room designed for 28. 

“Healthcare workers have told us that patients had to be placed in stretchers lining public hallways without privacy or dignity in the birthplace of Medicare. This is a crisis, not a coincidence.” 

She says the privacy issues have made it hard to deal with patients struggling with incontinence or needing to be changed.  

“When you have an emergency room, you can’t turn people away, but when you are consistently dealing with groups more than twice than what you’re expecting, it makes it very difficult for staff on the frontlines to do that work.”

She says meanwhile, City Hospital is facing its own pressures, such as being unable to retain a full-time physician. 

Mowat adds that this is just another reason why the NDP is calling on the province to reverse the $17 million cut it made to healthcare in the recent budget. 

‘This is not a time to be cutting healthcare, this is a time to be investing in frontline workers, making sure we have enough people to do those jobs, making sure we have enough beds to be able to provide that support.”