Region’s health gets failing grade

Michael Hilborn
Staff writer

According to the Northwestern Health Unit, the Kenora/Rainy River district is not exactly a healthy place to live. Furthermore, it’s getting worse.
This cheery message, the basis of an address to the Rainy River District Municipal Association annual meeting in Stratton on Saturday, came complete with graphs and flow charts to back it up.
Director of Program Planning Val Mann told the audience, residents eat too much, smoke too much, drink too much and tend to incur serious injuries more than in most of the other 36 health regions in Canada. We are also getting older as a population. This, she says, in conjunction with a lower health-care budget than the national or provincial average is a crisis in the making.
“We have a lower life expectancy than elsewhere in Ontario or the Canadian average,” she said.
According to Mann, the district has the highest mortality rates in the province from cancer, cardiovascular disease, strokes, injury and poisoning.
Much of this, she says is self imposed and therefore, preventable.
“Surveys show we have more smokers here than the provincial or national average,” she continued. “Also, people report more heavy drinking and lower consumption of fruits and vegetables than the average.” There are also more people exposed to second-hand smoke, she added.
Another factor, she said, is the unemployment rate, which is in the top half of the national average. That may account for the tendency for young people to leave the area and find employment elsewhere, which in turn, also accounts for the aging trend.
“Our population is graying,” she observed. “We have increased numbers of seniors and decreased numbers of children.” This trend is reversed in the native population, where young people are increasing more quickly, she added.
Northwestern Medical Officer of Health and CEO Dr. Pete Sarsfield summed up both problems after Mann’s address.
“What you’ve seen is a grim health picture,” he said. “Were treading water and need more funds. We just don’t have the ability to pay for these things in Northwestern Ontario.”
Dr. Sarsfield didn’t place all the blame on underfunding, however. He also pointed a finger squarely at the choices people here have made, or failed to make.
“There is a burden of preventable illness here that is the worst in the country,” he claimed.
Financial Director Ed Przednowek said the board has averaged only a two percent increase in the budget over the last four years – the lowest in the country. The national average, he said is eight percent. This year, the board is requesting a $1.1 million increase in funding. Some of this will come from an increase in the municipal levy, which is now the highest in the province.
After the address, Dr. Sarsfield and Environmental Health Team Director Bill Limerick fielded questions from the floor, most of which concerned the ongoing battle between the board and district businesses that have failed to comply with the new anti-smoking regulations brought in by the board in the new year. There was virtually unanimous support for the board’s tough stand in laying complaints against businesses not in compliance. However, Dr. Sarsfield reminded the listeners this matter has yet to be tested by the courts and will not likely be resolved any time soon.