Fourteen ambulances with emergency patients were backlogged in the Red Deer Hospital parking lot Monday waiting to access the emergency department..That prompted the Alberta NDP to call on the UCP to stop throwing the health system into further chaos so residents in Red Deer and central Alberta can access needed care. .“The UCP’s damage to care is so severe that instead of accessing a hospital, patients are being cared for in a parking lot,” said David Shepherd, NDP critic for Health..“The province is experiencing an emergency in ambulance wait times right now and having 14 ambulances wait in a hospital parking lot takes them away from responding to other urgent calls.”.“I can’t imagine how the patient and EMS crew in that fourteenth ambulance must have felt as they sat queued up behind 13 others, waiting to get to the emergency room.” .The Red Deer hospital is facing added pressure because of hospital closures across central Alberta. The communities of Rimbey, Rocky Mountain House, Sundre, Three Hills, and Hanna all are experiencing bed closures and service reductions in their hospitals due to UCP-driven staff shortages. .Doctors are also leaving the province at record rates and medical student residency positions in Alberta are going unfilled across the province. .“I have been speaking directly with frontline healthcare professionals in Red Deer who are feeling burnt out and neglected and abandoned by this UCP government,” said Shepherd..“The UCP’s hostility is driving health workers out of the province which is leading to the hospital closures, surgery cancellations, long ambulance wait times, and parking lot medicine that central Alberta is experiencing.”.Arthur Green is a Western Standard contributor.agreen@westernstandard.news.,.Follow on Twitter @artcgreen
