Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Good morning. I want to welcome you all to Fort McMurray.
Before I start, I just want to give you an understanding of our region. Our region is not just Fort McMurray. We also have the west side, where there are no natural linkages or roads; there are no airlines taking us to the other side, so all our travel and organization has to be done through Edmonton and up. It's quite a complex region in some ways.
I'm very pleased to present a summary of our challenges this morning, and I hope to find out what your standing committee can do for us here in Fort McMurray. The comments I will be making are critical to the sustainability of our health system in the Northern Lights Health Region.
The cumulative effects of the oil sands development, the rapid population growth, the lack of investment in ramping up our human resources capacity--and if you think it takes a long time to develop technicians, you know how long it takes to develop health professionals, doctors and other professionals--infrastructure, funding, and the high cost of housing has outstripped our ability to deliver effective health care services to our region.
Using a population base of 80,000 from the current census--and that's not including the camp population or the shadow population that exists in our region, the invisible population that everybody says doesn't live here--will reflect the seriousness of our challenges in the health system. About $53 billion worth of projects have been identified in our community over the next four years; that would be the equivalent of $662 billion worth of capital projects if we did it on a per capita basis in Edmonton or Calgary. So we need to be worried in the health region. If we took Ottawa, it would probably be the equivalent of $800 billion worth of initiatives on a population of that size. This is how we see the world in the health system. We are very concerned about our ability to sustain what we're currently doing.
It goes without saying that some of the greatest challenges we've ever had are here today. Are we in a crisis? Yes, we are, definitely.
Human resources: We don't have enough people, physicians, nurses, health professionals. We don't have enough capacity in infrastructure. We have 102 acute-care beds today to deliver all of what we're being asked to do. If this situation existed anywhere else in Canada it would be dealt with right away. Yet we are left on our own to try to solve the major challenges as a result of the continuing growth pressures.
Funding: We're currently running a major deficit as well, and we're legislated not to run deficits, so we have tremendous pressures. The housing costs are a major deterrent; they're a recruitment and retention killer for us. The winning conditions we need to retain our people are simply not here; they don't exist in the health system. Why would you work here when you can make the same salary, the same benefits, anywhere else? Physicians, nurses, and other health staff make exactly the same salary no matter where they live in Alberta. So, again, that's a challenge for us.
Investment in infrastructure in such places as Fort McMurray is essential if one of the economic engines of Canada is to be sustained. All of Canada benefits greatly from oil sands development except the people who live here in Fort McMurray, people like those at the Northern Lights Health Region. They are entitled to receive reasonable access to primary health care and acute care.
We are losing ground. We have a 41% physician vacancy rate, a 20% staff vacancy rate, and it's growing. We've just lost another six physicians in the last few months, so it's probably much higher than that.
The lack of infrastructure investment is exacerbating the issue. We just don't have the capacity to continue to provide what we're being expected to.
Very little has been done so far, and we don't think our voices are being heard as well as they should be.
What can the government do for us at Northern Lights? It must invest in infrastructure; it needs to create incentives to develop health professionals in the north or rural communities like ours, and along with the provincial government, it needs to provide incentives like a northern allowance. I was a deputy minister of health and social services in Nunavut, so I know how important those things are: tax incentives or housing subsidies to help overcome the major barriers to retention and recruitment.
We also need you to look at trying to invest in a sustainable health human resources strategy. When you look at the number of people who are retiring...150,000 nurses are leaving the profession, and there aren't 150,000 nurses to relieve the pressure.
The problems in the north and in rural communities of Canada, especially in Fort McMurray because of the growth, are more serious and need to be addressed. We're looking to you to help us with our human resources and infrastructure capacity.
Thank you.