B.C.’s health-care shortcomings violate patients’ constitutional rights: lawyers
VANCOUVER — British Columbia shouldn’t be allowed to bar patients from taking action privately to meet their own medical needs if the government is failing them in the public health-care system, a court has heard.
Peter Gall, a lawyer representing both a group of patients and the Cambie Surgery Centre in Vancouver, told B.C. Supreme Court on Tuesday that the province’s inability to provide its residents with timely access to health care violates their constitutional rights and can lead to prolonged suffering.
Easing restrictions on private health-care insurance for core medical services, currently banned by provincial law, would free up resources and shorten wait times by providing a “much-needed safety valve” for the public system, he said.
“The government cannot prohibit people from privately meeting their own health-care needs if they’re not being met in the public system. It’s really that simple and straightforward,” Gall said, speaking before a Vancouver courtroom packed with more than 100 people.