Saskatchewan nurses march for better conditions as provincial election nears

As political parties battle about the state of health care and what they will do to address the problems if they form government, health-care workers in Saskatchewan are urging better supports.

On Wednesday, hospital workers in Saskatoon held a solidarity walk in support of better working conditions and staffing for health-care workers. Saskatchewan NDP Leader Carla Beck was also in attendance.

“We are the ones that have to look our patients in the eye while the system fails them,” St. Paul’s Hospital RN Stephanie Fehr said.

Low staffing levels and unsafe working conditions have been a constant struggle for health-care workers in the province, resulting in hospitals and emergency rooms operating at levels significantly over-capacity.

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“Our emergency department at St Paul’s is sitting at 250 per cent capacity every day,” Fehr said. “Our new baseline is 200 per cent. That means we don’t have space to safely treat you when you have that emergency.

“It never ends. Pretty soon we’re going to be forced to treat our patients out on the street in front of emergency. That was the situation when I worked in Haiti.”

Service Employees International Union (SEIU) said nurses are used to a heavy workload, which is often prioritized over their own health. But even they have reached a breaking point.

“Quite frankly at this point, I’m seeing people leaving the health-care system because the combination of those pressures is just crushing people,” SEIU president Barbara Cape said.

Despite the increasing pressures and challenges, nurses like Nicole Neufeld said they need to keep going for the patients.

“It’s frustrating…but we’re not defeated,” Neufeld said. “We’re going to keep fighting and we’re going to keep showing up for our patients and keep looking after them because that is what we aim to do.”

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