File Photo

By Victor Kaisar

Maternity Issues

B.C. doctors pen letter in support of Kamloops OBGYNs as opposition MLAs press government on maternity crisis

Oct 27, 2025 | 6:22 PM

KAMLOOPS — The BC Conservative Party has released a letter co-signed by over a hundred doctors, including several obstetrician-gynecologists (OBGYNs) from across the province, in a bid to call attention to the ongoing maternity crisis at Royal Inland Hospital.

At last check, the Oct. 17 letter, which is addressed to Interior Health President and CEO Sylvia Weir and B.C. Health Minister Josie Osborne, had 128 signatories. It was authored just days after all seven OBGYNs at RIH announced plans to resign, citing unsafe working conditions.

“This decision reflects deep and ongoing concerns about maternity care, gynecology services, and women’s health in our region,” the letter written by Dr. Chelsea Elwood and Dr. Stephen Kaye, said.

“These physicians have long advocated for better access to care in Kamloops, yet despite years of engagement, their calls for change have been ignored.”

In the letter, Elwood and Kaye said they have raised alarms about this “looming maternity crisis” in the past, but their concerns were “similarly dismissed.”

Question of the Week

Has the violence in Mexico changed your opinion about travelling there for a vacation?

7h ago

Looped In

LOOPED IN WITH NIKKI OMEN: February 23, 2026

12h ago

1000 WAYS TO HEAL

1000 WAYS TO HEAL: Understanding the Bully

12h ago

“The consequences are now materializing: the loss of Kamloops as a key mid-sized maternity hub will have real and immediate impacts on patients,” they noted.

Their letter goes on to state that decision by the Kamloops OBGYN’s will cause surgical wait times to increase as existing providers – including those outside of Kamloops – will be stretched even further.

“When OBGYNs are undervalued, so too are women and their health across B.C.,” the letter added.

Letter debated during Question Period

In a statement, Kamloops Centre Conservative MLA, Peter Milobar, who raised the letter in the BC Legislature Monday (Oct. 27), said Health Minister Osborne needs to “respond quickly with a real, sustainable plan, not another round of empty promises.”

“Women should never have to question whether help will be there when they need it most,” Milobar said. “The Minister didn’t listen to the seven OBGYNs in Kamloops – maybe she’ll finally listen to the 130 OBGYNs and the hundreds of residents who rallied this weekend demanding action.”

“Women across B.C. are watching, and they deserve to know their health and safety come first.”

Kelowna Centre MLA Kristina Loewen also asked Osborne whether there would be an independent review of Interior Health, citing the maternity issues in Kamloops as well as recent issues with pediatrics in Kelowna and psychiatrists in Vernon.

“We have a retention problem,” Loewen said. “Families are losing access to care. Frontline workers are burning out, and the Minister of Health is still pretending it’s under control.”

Osborne said a review of all health authorities is already underway to try and redirect administrative spending towards frontline care. Interior Health has also eliminated 91 administrative positions in a move that it said was not linked to the provincial review.

“It is no secret, I know, that the health care system is under strain, that things are hard,” Osborne said. “That’s why we need to do everything we can to support every single physician, nurse, nurse practitioner, allied health professional out there, who is working their heart out to support the people of this province.”

“We’re going to continue that work to support those health care workers and to continue to build and strengthen the system.”

Kelowna-Mission Gavin Dew also said Monday that “nothing has changed” under new Weir, who officially took over as Interior Health’s top administrator earlier this month after Susan Brown stepped down in June.

“It’s still the same regime, the same broken trust, the same service interruptions as doctors walk away. It’s clear there has been a failure to reset the system,” Dew, who previously called for Brown’s resignation, said.

“What is the Minister of Health going to do today to start actually rebuilding confidence and trust for the doctors, nurses and health care professionals who work in Interior Health and for the people and families who depend on it?”

“The leadership team at Interior Health has my confidence and I know the new CEO is working hard each and every single day, as is every health care worker in the Interior Health system,” Osborne responded.

“This is a health authority that continues to do the work, and I will continue to support them in the work that they are doing.”

Negotiations underway to rectify issues: Osborne

In Victoria, Osborne also said it is her expectation that the doctors in Kamloops and Interior Health “will come together to talk through these issues [and] to undertake the negotiations that are underway right now.”

“The priority must always be the patients, the families, the people,” she said, noting the government will do what it can to support maternity services in Kamloops and across the province.

“I am confident that if they do that, they can come together.”

Interior Health previously told CFJC that while recruitment is underway, it also hopes that something can be done to avoid the mass exodus at RIH. It is also offering locum doctors willing to fill maternity shifts at RIH more than $7,000 per day.

“We are alarmed by the short-sighted reliance on locum physicians as stopgaps and the unrealistic plan to recruit 12 new OBGYNs to a community where current staff have been unsupported and exposed to unsafe working conditions,” the letter from Elwood and Kaye added.

“The use of these short term stopgaps rather than negotiating fairly with the current OBGYN group has not gone unnoticed.”

All of the signatories to the letter have said they will not be participating in any temporary coverage plans put forward by Interior Health or in the supervision of new hires under current conditions.

“We urge the health authority and the Ministry of Health to abandon this reactive approach, acknowledge the systemic failures that led us here, and work in good faith with the Kamloops OBGYNs to find a sustainable solution,” the letter noted.

In the Legislature, Milobar also said the BC Conservatives raised concerns about “the 12 phantom new OBGYNs last week,” adding the letter raised those concerns, once again.

“And yet in her first answer today, the minister clung to these 12 OBGYNs coming in as new recruits,” Milobar said.

To which Osborne responded, “those negotiations take place at a table, not here in this House, not during question period. That is why it is so important that Interior Health continues to sit down with these OBGYNs [and] with other OBGYNs].”

You can read the letter sent to Interior Health and the Province here.