Nursing in Ontario...

Oh boy. 

So you've probably been reading the news lately that many hospitals in the GTA and surrounding regions (I will say it's a majority of Ontario hospitals) are letting go of certain Registered Nurses positions for different units. 

Royal Victoria Hospital. Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre. Toronto General Hospital. Queensway Carleton Hospital. London Health Sciences Centre. St. Joseph's Health Care (Hamilton). Mount Sinai Hospital. Lakeridge Hospital. You know, just to name a few. 

Since January 2025, there have been over 1300 RN positions cut. 

Ontario already has the nation's worst nurse to patient ratio. BC has fought and implemented a standard nurse to patient ratio and are currently undergoing a strike across Surrey, Vancouver and now Vancouver Island all because negotiation contract has failed. If anything, we in Ontario should also be following what BC is doing. 

However, different provinces have different legislation. The Harris government had banned nurses from striking here in Ontario back in the 1990's, making nursing an essential service. It's up to the next provincial government to take a stand and remove that limit, so nurses can have the power to strike. This doesn't mean that all nurses head to the picket lines all at the same time otherwise no one would be running the hospitals. They'd have to do it on a rotational basis. 

When Ontario negotiations between the ONA and hospitals fail to reach an agreement with wages, it goes into arbitration and many times, ONA settles with whatever the hospital has put forth. Whether it's a 1% increase in wage over 3 years or max, 2.5% and it's been like that since the beginning of time. The last 'win' we had was about 3.5% over 2-3 years, which compared to the rate of inflation, we are VERY far behind. Take into consideration that the Ford government has 'given' money to all the hospitals to expand on building more services, which is great BUT who is running these new units and hospital sections?! Not to mention with all these constructions and upgrades, the hospitals are also now increasing parking fees for staff and visitors. I'll give you an example: for 10 years, our parking fees never increased which I am so thankful for. I was paying about $52 a month for parking. It's a HUGE bargain compared to other hospitals who charge $135+ a month. When we got the email that our parking fees would increase to $63 a month, and then a final of $120 a month by the year 2029, it pissed me off. The reason for this increase: because they're building a brand new building, an extension to the existing hospitals. I don't get it - government gave you money to build this, WHY are you now taking MORE money from us staff?! That 3.5% wage increase means nothing when our parking fees just went up 100%+.

UHN has let go of 20+ full time RNs and some part times as well in the nephrology unit, all because the unit was not getting enough dialysis patients to sustain the unit. This is all in ONE unit. Considering 1 in 10 Canadians have some form of kidney disease, it doesn't help that the pre-requisites to kidney disease is high blood pressure and diabetes. Together, that risk increases and without proper maintenance, it would lead to kidney failure, and boom, dialysis. But UHN decides to reduce their unit because they don't have enough patients. HUH? What do you mean?! I call your unit to ask about transfers and you tell me there's no space. But now you're telling me there aren't enough patients, that you have to reduce your capacity. MAKE IT MAKE SENSE!

The goal of all this RN lay offs and "restructuring"? They want to balance the books - hire more RPNs (and PSWs) with less RNs. Why not? RPNs can pretty much do everything a RN can do, except cheaper. The only thing RPNs can't do at this time is looking after critically ill patients, or patients who suddenly go acute. PSWs can do all the basics a RPN can do, except give medications or blood transfusions, but they do all the heavy work - the lifting, changing diapers, showering, feeding. If a unit can run half RNs, and half RPNs, the unit wouldn't have to spend that much money if they had 3/4 RNs with 1/4 RPNs on the floor. Especially when it comes to overtime - unit would rather pay OT for RPNs than RNs.

Ultimately, who pays the price? The patients. The patients pay the price through their health. Why is it that I always get everyone to advocate for their loved ones when they're in hospital? Because I guarantee you, you probably won't see the nurse very often. And if you don't want your loved ones to fall off the bed, or code without anyone witnessing, then I suggest accompanying your loved ones to hospital and be their personal nurse for the duration of their hospital stay, until they get discharged home. 

Meanwhile our drugged up Health Minister of Ontario, Sylvia Jones, says there have been over 100,000 nurses who have been registered in Ontario since 2018. That doesn't mean ANYTHING AT ALL if they're not practicing! Anyone can register to say I passed my exam and now I'm a nurse, but how many of them are going out of province or across to the USA for better pay? Those don't get accounted. I don't get why people aren't more angry at this. Because they probably don't care, or are just clueless. EVERYONE should be pissed off first of all that they elected someone with a radio broadcast diploma to be the HEALTH MINISTER. What does she know about being the health minister?? Obviously not very much considering the disaster of the hospitals currently. She should've become a weather reporter and lied about the weather instead. She would do so much better in that role - it's better suited for her lying personality. 

The other problem is with the Baby Boomers now aging and retiring (if not already retired), they need to fill at least 30,000 nursing vacancies in order to not be short staffed. But given the fact that they're cutting more RNs and replacing with RPNs (who have 2 years education compared to the 4 years to become a RN), what happens if you have patients who go acutely sour? Who they passing on the critical care patient to? 

Just a food for thought the next time you need to seek help in a hospital.

The next time you get lazy and don't vote, you are paying the price for your health care.