Response failed health workersSARS report says Labour Ministry effectively sidelined during crisis
By Helen Branswell
A nurse wears protective clothing outside the door of a quarantined SARS patient at Sunnybrook and Women's Hospital, March 17, 2003. (CP File Photo/Kevin Frayer)
TORONTO (CP) — The final report of a commission into Toronto’s SARS crisis says those involved in the response failed to ensure the safety of health-care workers, who continued to become infected throughout the four months the virus plagued Ontario hospitals.
The report by Justice Archie Campbell suggests the Ontario Ministry of Labour play a lead role in the response to future infectious disease outbreaks in hospitals to ensure that workplace safety is given the highest priority.
The 1,204-page report said the Labour Ministry was effectively sidelined during SARS, which claimed 44 lives during the outbreak in the spring of 2003. And it suggested health-care workers would have been better protected if occupational health experts were involved.
Campbell was ill and unable to attend a news conference Tuesday as the report was released, but the chief counsel for the commission, Doug Hunt, made a statement and took questions.
Campbell’s report said changes made throughout the health-care and the public-health sectors in the wake of SARS mean that the people of Ontario are safer than they were before the disease hit.
“He’s found that although the Ontario government and individual hospitals have taken significant steps to improve our level of protection from infectious outbreaks, serious problems still persist and much remains to be done,” Hunt said.
The report recommended dozens of changes to hospital practices, disease surveillance and provincial public health and emergency legislation.
Forty-five per cent of Ontario’s 375 SARS cases were health-care workers, and two nurses and a doctor died from SARS.
The report said hospitals are as dangerous a place to work as mines and factories. But Ontario hospital workers don’t enjoy the same level of workplace protection as workers in those other sectors.
Campbell said SARS was a disaster waiting to happen, because Ontario’s public health system had been badly neglected by successive governments of various political stripes.
“He observed that Vancouver certainly did a better job than Toronto in dealing with SARS,” Hunt said.
“He found that this was a result of a combination of Vancouver’s better state of preparedness and systemic strengths, along with a certain measure of good fortune in how the case came to the attention of Vancouver authorities.”
Campbell refused to scapegoat individuals, saying that, in the end, all Ontarians are to blame for not demanding the province put better protections in place.
Hunt said that Campbell is adamant that the report can’t just occupy space on shelves and become covered in dust.
The government needs to address the issues that was raised in order to prepare for when a pandemic or another new strange disease comes along, Hunt said.
By Helen Branswell
A nurse wears protective clothing outside the door of a quarantined SARS patient at Sunnybrook and Women's Hospital, March 17, 2003. (CP File Photo/Kevin Frayer)
TORONTO (CP) — The final report of a commission into Toronto’s SARS crisis says those involved in the response failed to ensure the safety of health-care workers, who continued to become infected throughout the four months the virus plagued Ontario hospitals.
The report by Justice Archie Campbell suggests the Ontario Ministry of Labour play a lead role in the response to future infectious disease outbreaks in hospitals to ensure that workplace safety is given the highest priority.
The 1,204-page report said the Labour Ministry was effectively sidelined during SARS, which claimed 44 lives during the outbreak in the spring of 2003. And it suggested health-care workers would have been better protected if occupational health experts were involved.
Campbell was ill and unable to attend a news conference Tuesday as the report was released, but the chief counsel for the commission, Doug Hunt, made a statement and took questions.
Campbell’s report said changes made throughout the health-care and the public-health sectors in the wake of SARS mean that the people of Ontario are safer than they were before the disease hit.
“He’s found that although the Ontario government and individual hospitals have taken significant steps to improve our level of protection from infectious outbreaks, serious problems still persist and much remains to be done,” Hunt said.
The report recommended dozens of changes to hospital practices, disease surveillance and provincial public health and emergency legislation.
Forty-five per cent of Ontario’s 375 SARS cases were health-care workers, and two nurses and a doctor died from SARS.
The report said hospitals are as dangerous a place to work as mines and factories. But Ontario hospital workers don’t enjoy the same level of workplace protection as workers in those other sectors.
Campbell said SARS was a disaster waiting to happen, because Ontario’s public health system had been badly neglected by successive governments of various political stripes.
“He observed that Vancouver certainly did a better job than Toronto in dealing with SARS,” Hunt said.
“He found that this was a result of a combination of Vancouver’s better state of preparedness and systemic strengths, along with a certain measure of good fortune in how the case came to the attention of Vancouver authorities.”
Campbell refused to scapegoat individuals, saying that, in the end, all Ontarians are to blame for not demanding the province put better protections in place.
Hunt said that Campbell is adamant that the report can’t just occupy space on shelves and become covered in dust.
The government needs to address the issues that was raised in order to prepare for when a pandemic or another new strange disease comes along, Hunt said.
