Creepy, Godless Canada: ‘I’m not sure we care enough:’ Cultural shift needed to stop tragedy in care homes, experts say

shockedcanadian

Diamond Member
Aug 6, 2012
27,527
24,284
2,405
In Canada they abuse you when you are young and abuse you when you are old. They sell you out like a tramp in your prime. We have lost thousands in these homes, some of the "residents" there, have been lying in their own waste for days. Par for the course in creepy, covert Canada.

THIS is Canada. Your ally. The nation some of you admire and want to become more like.

If you follow us, you will indeed, follow us...



The tragedy playing out in Ontario’s long-term-care facilities has thrust problems plaguing the system for decades, into the spotlight, experts say.

In November, the Ontario government promised it would bring a “gold standard” to the province’s long-term care homes by hiring thousands more staff and giving residents four hours each of direct care daily. Yet governments of various political stripes have promised to address the issue for decades. And dire conditions persist.

What political obstacles stand in the way of progress — and what would it take finally to act? The Star asked several experts, who offered a clear but daunting prescription: We need to confront deep-seated cultural and societal issues.

Former Ontario Health Minister George Smitherman said a “cultural shift” in attitudes toward the elderly and those who care for them is needed to bring about changes to the troubled sector, which has plagued successive provincial governments.

“I just don’t think we’ve shown the love for those we’ve expected to bring the love,” Smitherman said.

Since the beginning of the pandemic nearly 2,800 residents and eight staff members in Ontario’s long-term-care homes have died of COVID-19. Stories have trickled out of squalid conditions and elderly residents being left alone, banging on walls for help, as understaffed homes struggle to meet their needs and have led to legal cases and protests by family members.

Smitherman said there have been improvements to the sector since he was charged with reform two decades ago. “I inherited a model where people were being tethered to their beds and there wasn’t even a nurse on site by law,” he said. Still, he added, “The change has proven to be incremental, not transformative.”

He said the slow pace of change is partly because the care home sector doesn’t get the respect from society enjoyed by hospitals, which are frequented by a larger proportion of the population and employ people with higher levels of training. The result? Many promises have been made in years past to improve pay for support workers, yet governments haven’t delivered. Indeed, they haven’t even been able to complete a long-promised registry for support workers, he added.



Some blame a system that allows homes to be run for profit. A study in August published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal found for-profit homes are more likely to experience more severe COVID-19 outbreaks and deaths, though the chances of having an outbreak were the same as non-profit homes. The study found the death rate was 29 per cent higher at for-profit homes than non-profit homes at 23.4 per thousand.

Many, including federal new Democrat leader Jagmeet Singh, have slammed the for-profit centres for their handling of the outbreaks. Singh called on the federal government to turn Revera, a retirement and long-term-care home company owned by a crown corporation managing public service pensions, into a publicly managed entity.

But many issues in care homes don’t arise simply because of the for-profit model, said Raisa Deber a professor at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto.

“It’s not nearly as simple as we like to pretend it is,” Deber said.

She said long-term care is complex due to the varying needs of residents, stressing many of the duties of long-term care homes are not health related.


Such responsibilities include residents exercising, bathing and the kind of meals they’re served. There isn’t even a clear line marking the difference between a long-term-care home and a retirement home, she said, making it often difficult to decide who will end up in what type of home.

“One of the problems you run into with long-term care is a whole bunch of it is just the activities and daily living,” she said. “That’s never been anything that under our medicare system is considered to be needing to be publicly funded.”

Calling it a “social-care issue,” she said the province must for the first time clearly define what is a public role and what is a private role before it can make meaningful improvements to long-term care.
 
There was a time, so I've read, that people took care of their own- when a gov't (or any entity for that matter) claims it can absolve personal responsibility, what you get is what we're seeing in the US and I'm sure Canada is similar, since politicians are politicians no matter where they play their games-
 
As an 83-year-old, I am of course interested in this topic.

First, there are some "nice" nursing homes in the States. In fact, probably some seniors prefer to live there than with their children.

Second, there are, of course, some hellholes. They are just warehouses for the old until they die. The staff members are paid poorly and could not care less about the seniors' welfare.

Of course, the COVID nightmare has only intensified the problems. Many times the staff are overworked and stressed out.

Here in the States, there is a debate between capitalism or socialism. I am guessing that in most cases a senior in a privately owned nursing home may have a better chance of satisfactory treatment than in a nursing home where the staff are government employees.
 
When I retired, before starting my new career, I studied Nursing and worked in a chronic care facility.

A large number of care workers and nurse in Aged Care and Mental Health are from Mexico, Central America, Africa and The Caribbean.

They all told me the same thing. If you're the richest person in their home country, you wouldn't consider for a moment putting your family members, particularly your parents, into aged care. You would care for them at home, the same way your parents cared for you.

Their societies would shun them like murderers if they packed off their parents into a nursing home.
 
Well, at 73, IDGAF- I won't put me, or mine, in a situation of do or die at another's behest- I will not be a burden. Period.
 
Well, at 73, IDGAF- I won't put me, or mine, in a situation of do or die at another's behest- I will not be a burden. Period.

Yes, that's when you live in a FREE country. Where you pursue your dreams and have individual liberty from state powers.

In Canada we have creepy, covert police from the RCMP on down and THEY are your GOD. They will decide if you can work, eat, sleep or live. Once you are old and no longer able to earn money or take care of yourself, they laugh at your plight, the plight they and the other cowards in Canada helped put you in, as they and their dumb children are set up in the kakistocracy of nepotism.

I believed in Candas capitalism and freedoms. I was as dumb as the next fool in Canada. We are a creepy replica of East Germany and some in your nation want to drag you down to our soulless system. You can bet some flakes in Canada want to drag you to where we are also.

You guys think I'm exagerrating and engaging in hyperbole. Some of you are weak defenders of Canada. Maybe cops yourselves who believe that cops in Canada are the same as in the U.S. For the most part, no, we are entirely different systems.

As they say in Canada, "you know a Canadian cop is lying when you see his lips moving".
 

This anecdotal perspective comes from a right leaning website with a questionable reporting history.

 
Yes, that's when you live in a FREE country. Where you pursue your dreams and have individual liberty from state powers.
Where is that utopia? Certainly not here- we may not be as bad as Canada, but, free, we ain't.

In comparison to our system, you are as free as the wind.

The pandemic has just exposed our system to the rest of the nation who had their head in the sand. They now realize "oh shyte, it's NOT just the other guy who getting shafted, it's going to be me too!".

TPS, OPP, RCMP are a national security threat. Heed the warning some of us provide and not the in-house Canadians who come on and tell you are great we have it. If there are steep consequences to Canadas reputation and economy, only then will there be drastic changes and a firm enforcement of our Charter of Rights.

Capitalism demands freedom, accountability and justice. We have police who have committed crimes sometimes even murdered people and they aren't fired from their jobs. Even years after being charged. These are the more honourable ones in uniform, the covert get away with the Devils agenda.
 

This anecdotal perspective comes from a right leaning website with a questionable reporting history.


LOL. The Toronto Star is NOT right leaning. It's one of the most liberal papers in Canada. You might find a few more further left in B.C, but certainly in Ontario, Toronto Star is full left, union supporting. I don't mind the paper because they at least call out human right abuses. I pick and choose my articles based on the substance. I'm not an ideologue because I see filth and angels in all political stripes.

Right leaning are, National Post, Globe and Mail, Toronto Sun (I guess they would be your NY Post, but more of a rag then hard hitting to be honest). CBC is the only media further left than Toronto Star as far as I am concerned.
 
In Canada they abuse you when you are young and abuse you when you are old. They sell you out like a tramp in your prime. We have lost thousands in these homes, some of the "residents" there, have been lying in their own waste for days. Par for the course in creepy, covert Canada.

THIS is Canada. Your ally. The nation some of you admire and want to become more like.

If you follow us, you will indeed, follow us...



The tragedy playing out in Ontario’s long-term-care facilities has thrust problems plaguing the system for decades, into the spotlight, experts say.

In November, the Ontario government promised it would bring a “gold standard” to the province’s long-term care homes by hiring thousands more staff and giving residents four hours each of direct care daily. Yet governments of various political stripes have promised to address the issue for decades. And dire conditions persist.

What political obstacles stand in the way of progress — and what would it take finally to act? The Star asked several experts, who offered a clear but daunting prescription: We need to confront deep-seated cultural and societal issues.

Former Ontario Health Minister George Smitherman said a “cultural shift” in attitudes toward the elderly and those who care for them is needed to bring about changes to the troubled sector, which has plagued successive provincial governments.

“I just don’t think we’ve shown the love for those we’ve expected to bring the love,” Smitherman said.

Since the beginning of the pandemic nearly 2,800 residents and eight staff members in Ontario’s long-term-care homes have died of COVID-19. Stories have trickled out of squalid conditions and elderly residents being left alone, banging on walls for help, as understaffed homes struggle to meet their needs and have led to legal cases and protests by family members.

Smitherman said there have been improvements to the sector since he was charged with reform two decades ago. “I inherited a model where people were being tethered to their beds and there wasn’t even a nurse on site by law,” he said. Still, he added, “The change has proven to be incremental, not transformative.”

He said the slow pace of change is partly because the care home sector doesn’t get the respect from society enjoyed by hospitals, which are frequented by a larger proportion of the population and employ people with higher levels of training. The result? Many promises have been made in years past to improve pay for support workers, yet governments haven’t delivered. Indeed, they haven’t even been able to complete a long-promised registry for support workers, he added.



Some blame a system that allows homes to be run for profit. A study in August published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal found for-profit homes are more likely to experience more severe COVID-19 outbreaks and deaths, though the chances of having an outbreak were the same as non-profit homes. The study found the death rate was 29 per cent higher at for-profit homes than non-profit homes at 23.4 per thousand.

Many, including federal new Democrat leader Jagmeet Singh, have slammed the for-profit centres for their handling of the outbreaks. Singh called on the federal government to turn Revera, a retirement and long-term-care home company owned by a crown corporation managing public service pensions, into a publicly managed entity.

But many issues in care homes don’t arise simply because of the for-profit model, said Raisa Deber a professor at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto.

“It’s not nearly as simple as we like to pretend it is,” Deber said.

She said long-term care is complex due to the varying needs of residents, stressing many of the duties of long-term care homes are not health related.


Such responsibilities include residents exercising, bathing and the kind of meals they’re served. There isn’t even a clear line marking the difference between a long-term-care home and a retirement home, she said, making it often difficult to decide who will end up in what type of home.

“One of the problems you run into with long-term care is a whole bunch of it is just the activities and daily living,” she said. “That’s never been anything that under our medicare system is considered to be needing to be publicly funded.”

Calling it a “social-care issue,” she said the province must for the first time clearly define what is a public role and what is a private role before it can make meaningful improvements to long-term care.
I thought that with government run health care they offer the elderly assisted suicide rather than lying in their own waste until they die.

That's what I thought the humane thing to do with the elderly according to Progressives.
 
LOL. The Toronto Star is NOT right leaning. It's one of the most liberal papers in Canada. You might find a few more further left in B.C, but certainly in Ontario, Toronto Star is full left, union supporting. I don't mind the paper because they at least call out human right abuses. I pick and choose my articles based on the substance. I'm not an ideologue because I see filth and angels in all political stripes.

Right leaning are, National Post, Globe and Mail, Toronto Sun (I guess they would be your NY Post, but more of a rag then hard hitting to be honest). CBC is the only media further left than Toronto Star as far as I am concerned.

I guess I got the wrong website. Either way your bullshit is still bullshit. Canada is one of the happiest nations in the world. Congratulations on being miserable in one of the happiest countries on Earth.
 
LOL. The Toronto Star is NOT right leaning. It's one of the most liberal papers in Canada. You might find a few more further left in B.C, but certainly in Ontario, Toronto Star is full left, union supporting. I don't mind the paper because they at least call out human right abuses. I pick and choose my articles based on the substance. I'm not an ideologue because I see filth and angels in all political stripes.

Right leaning are, National Post, Globe and Mail, Toronto Sun (I guess they would be your NY Post, but more of a rag then hard hitting to be honest). CBC is the only media further left than Toronto Star as far as I am concerned.

I guess I got the wrong website. Either way your bullshit is still bullshit. Canada is one of the happiest nations in the world. Congratulations on being miserable in one of the happiest countries on Earth.
Maybe Canada can start throwing the elderly in dumpsters like they do unborn babies. Neither have any money and are completely dependent on others and really no good to the state whatsoever.
 
I thought that with government run health care they offer the elderly assisted suicide rather than lying in their own waste until they die.

We can see them again every Tuesday ...

Soylent-Green.jpg
 
LOL. The Toronto Star is NOT right leaning. It's one of the most liberal papers in Canada. You might find a few more further left in B.C, but certainly in Ontario, Toronto Star is full left, union supporting. I don't mind the paper because they at least call out human right abuses. I pick and choose my articles based on the substance. I'm not an ideologue because I see filth and angels in all political stripes.

Right leaning are, National Post, Globe and Mail, Toronto Sun (I guess they would be your NY Post, but more of a rag then hard hitting to be honest). CBC is the only media further left than Toronto Star as far as I am concerned.

I guess I got the wrong website. Either way your bullshit is still bullshit. Canada is one of the happiest nations in the world. Congratulations on being miserable in one of the happiest countries on Earth.

You see, that's the kind of apologists we don't need.

You know the old saying "ignorance is bliss"? That sums up Canada almost perfectly. The PR is very strong in Canada and global nations fully support this because they want Americans to think "wow, those Canadians have it so great, why can't we be just like them"?

How many move to Canada vs. how many move to the U.S? It isn't just the weather, because there are places in B.C which have far better weather than NY or Chicago, yet, the stampede only moves one way.

Canada is fine if you are a government lackey. A member of the Stasi, if you will. Otherwise, America is land of opportunity. You wouldn't understand it unless you lived it.

It's why I beg you guys to defend America. We need you to lead the world and give Canadians perspective on freedom vs. optics. If you fail, we are going to be finished even quicker than our current course.
 
Canada ranks 16th
The US ranks 45th

in this freedom of the press


Then there is this from Cato Institute

On a scale of 0 to 10, where 10 represents more freedom, the average human freedom rating for 162 countries in 2018 was 6.93. Among countries included in this year’s and last year’s report, the level of freedom scarcely improved (0.01) compared with 2017, with 87 countries increasing their ratings and 70 decreasing. Since 2008, the level of global freedom has decreased slightly (−0.04), with 70 countries in the index increasing their ratings and 70 decreasing.

This from Heritage using Rule of Law, Gov't size, Regulatory efficiency, and Open Markets

Country Rankings
 
LOL. The Toronto Star is NOT right leaning. It's one of the most liberal papers in Canada. You might find a few more further left in B.C, but certainly in Ontario, Toronto Star is full left, union supporting. I don't mind the paper because they at least call out human right abuses. I pick and choose my articles based on the substance. I'm not an ideologue because I see filth and angels in all political stripes.

Right leaning are, National Post, Globe and Mail, Toronto Sun (I guess they would be your NY Post, but more of a rag then hard hitting to be honest). CBC is the only media further left than Toronto Star as far as I am concerned.

I guess I got the wrong website. Either way your bullshit is still bullshit. Canada is one of the happiest nations in the world. Congratulations on being miserable in one of the happiest countries on Earth.
Some poll or survey where Canadians say they are happy has nothing to do with the condition of some long term facilities. There is zero logic in your post.
 
Canada ranks 16th
The US ranks 45th

in this freedom of the press


Then there is this from Cato Institute

On a scale of 0 to 10, where 10 represents more freedom, the average human freedom rating for 162 countries in 2018 was 6.93. Among countries included in this year’s and last year’s report, the level of freedom scarcely improved (0.01) compared with 2017, with 87 countries increasing their ratings and 70 decreasing. Since 2008, the level of global freedom has decreased slightly (−0.04), with 70 countries in the index increasing their ratings and 70 decreasing.

This from Heritage using Rule of Law, Gov't size, Regulatory efficiency, and Open Markets

Country Rankings

That's odd, because media ownership diversity in Canada is non-existent. I believe Bell Canada and Rogers own 50% of ALL media outlets in Canada. That's right, two big corporate owner groups tell Canadians what to think and believe. Following that is probably CBC, state run news. So those are the vast majority of the options here.

As such, there is no way that the U.S lags Canada be it in free speech or those getting out alternative views. Be it through investigative journalists or independent documentaries. I've read articles from Canadian media writers who lived in Washington, moved back to Canada and remarked that without question the U.S system is more vibrant in terms of debate and speech.
 

Forum List

Back
Top