Queens Manor, Liverpool. Photo Ed Halverson

It’s likely two long-term care homes in Queens will be replaced according to Health and Wellness Minister Zach Churchill.

The province announced $96.5 million in funding to replace or repair 17 facilities including Hillsview Acres and Queens Manor.

Churchill says the department is in conversation with administrators and boards of the long term care homes to learn whether they feel a refit or rebuild is warranted.

“I suspect that all that is going to point towards new builds for these facilities,” said Churchill. “We’re also looking at increasing the bed spaces available in Queens County too. Looking at the age of the buildings, looking at the fact that we need more beds and we’re going to be building more beds in that area, these are likely going to be new builds.”

Churchill says the recent announcement will add 264 more new long-term care spaces across the province to the 236 beds previously announced in January for a total of 500 new spaces.

The provincial PC party has released a plan calling for the creation of 2,500 new long-term care spaces.

But the health minister says the department’s data doesn’t support the need for that many new beds.

“We use demographic analysis and modeling to determine what the need is going to be into the future and we build our plans based around the math and the science there,” said Churchill. “We do see a turnover in this sector of close to 3,000 people a year and what we want to do is reduce the wait time that people are waiting.”

Churchill says the five to six months people are now waiting to be placed in a long-term care facility will be cut to two months based on this announcement.

He says it’s important not to overbuild capacity, as demand for those beds will eventually drop off.

Of the 500 new beds announced, six will be built in Queens.

Churchill expects a decision on which facilities will be rebuilt will come over the next few months with groundbreaking to follow in short order.

Government is projecting to have the new facilities up and running by 2026-27.

Reported by Ed Halverson 
E-mail: edhalversonnews@gmail.com
Twitter: @edwardhalverson

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Liverpool EHS station. Photo Ed Halverson

Calling an ambulance won’t always mean a ride to the hospital.

One of the findings in a new report released Monday said to reduce the amount of time ambulances sit in hospitals waiting to offload patients, they should be allowed to use their advanced medical training to treat some patients at home.

Nova Scotia minister of Health and Wellness Zach Churchill says the recommendations will take the onus off transportation and back onto patients.

“It’s going to improve patient care and it’s going to better support our paramedics and help them focus on doing what they signed up to do and that’s responding to emergent cases and saving lives.”

The province commissioned a report on Nova Scotia’s EHS system back in 2018 from consulting firm Fitch and Associates.

Government received the report in October of 2019 but because negotiations were underway between the province and EHS provider Emergency Medical Care, Inc. their findings were only made public Monday.

One of the authors of the report Guillermo Fuentes says overall, his firm is impressed with the EHS system in Nova Scotia, but the perception of the service paramedics provide needs to change.

“Focusing strictly on response times is doing a disfavour to patient outcomes when the focus really needs to be on the medical model.”

The report aims to reduce the number of people coming into hospital emergency departments and get those in the ED needing more care admitted into in-patients in a timely fashion.

Churchill announced he will be making a ministerial directive for ambulances to offload their patients within 30 minutes of arriving at an emergency department and for EDs to admit people to in-patient care within 12 hours.

The CEO of the health authority will be responsible for ensuring those timelines are met and reporting the results to the deputy minister.

The report also aims to reduce the amount of time ambulances are used to transport patients between health care facilities. The province previously announced three medical transport vans are expected to be on the road providing that service sometime this spring,

The newly agreed EHS contract calls for the non-emergency transportation system to be expanded.

Government has adopted 64 of 68 recommendations in the Fitch report.

The new contract for EHS services goes into effect April 1 and runs for five years with options to extend it to nine.

Reported by Ed Halverson 
E-mail: edhalversonnews@gmail.com
Twitter: @edwardhalverson

To listen to the broadcast of this story, press play below.

Education Minister Zach Churchill unveils $14 million for schools. Photo: screen shot from Zoom meeting

Nova Scotia is spending more to help students and schools through COVID-19.

Minister of Education and Early Childhood Development Zach Churchill announced $14.3 million from federal Back to School funding would be going to schools to assist with healthy food programs, math and literacy programs, and providing more personal protective equipment.

The $1.5 million investment in healthy food options for students is divided into two streams. $500,000 will go towards buying food for the school lunch programs and the remaining $1 million will support what the department is calling an emergency food response fund. Minister Churchill explained that will be used to respond to the food needs of students if they need to learn from home.

“That can look like pre-paid cards for the grocery store or it can look like delivered bags of food depending on the community, and we’ll leave that up to folks on the ground, on the front lines to determine the best way to get that food, in those situations to the students and families that need it,” said Churchill.

The bulk of the money at $4.1 million will be earmarked for new online math and literacy programs.

Another $3.8 million will be used to install 950 touchless water stations, ensuring they are available in every school.

And $2.7 million will ensure ventilation systems are routinely inspected and repaired. That money is over and above the budgeted costs for maintenance.

Churchill commended students and school staff for their efforts to stop the spread of the coronavirus during the second wave. He said so far, it looks like it’s working.

“Speaking on behalf of the education system I think our teachers, principals, support staff, our cleaners, our students should be proud as well because it seems at this point, the majority of people are doing their part to make a difference and protect people from the virus,” said Churchill.

With the holidays approaching, some universities are already looking at extending the Christmas break to allow students to better cope with COVID-19 restrictions around travel.

Churchill said his department hasn’t made a decision yet on whether or not they will follow suit.

“We’re considering our options so those conversations are ongoing currently, in terms of how to approach Christmas break and if there’s any adjustments we need to make in our plan,” said Churchill.

He said any changes will be made after consulting with public health.

The minister was also asked if his department had been approached by public health officials about moving rapid testing into the schools, given the large number of Nova Scotians who are directly connected to the education system.

“We leave that decision to public health. Our job here is to work with them on implementation of their directives and if they believe that that is a necessary tool to enhance our testing protocols here in Nova Scotia, we’ll, of course work with them to implement that,” said Churchill. “We have not received that recommendation to date.”

Reported by Ed Halverson 
E-mail: edhalversonnews@gmail.com
Twitter: @edwardhalverson

Nova Scotia Education and Early Childhood Development Minister Zach Churchill announces $21.5 million in at home technology support via Zoom. (Screenshot)

Nova Scotia is buying computers for students and upgrading school wireless networks in order to continue to educate kids through COVID-19.

Education and Early Childhood Development Minister Zach Churchill announced $21.5 million from the federal Safe Return to Class Fund will be used to address concerns raised by students, teachers and parents about online and computer access during the provincial lockdown this spring.

Churchill said close to 30,000 respondents submitted their experience with at-home education.

“It was clear that the experience was different from school to school, teacher to teacher, from home to home. So this year we’ve brought in some standards for at-home learning for teachers and support staff,” said Churchill. “We have guidelines in place to help direct them in terms of how they approach their learning. We have enhanced capabilities now with students having access to technology and also teleconferencing as well, for students who don’t have access to the internet.”

Churchill said the department has already secured the purchase of 24,000 Chromebooks. The province has received 3,000 of those and the remaining 21,000 units are expected in December. They also hope to buy another 8,000 Chromebooks in the new year.

The education minister said it will be up to the regional centres across Nova Scotia to determine where they will be needed.

“Our regions have done work to identify which households, which students, don’t have access to the tech and those will be the folks that receive the technology. This is about ensuring that there’s not a digital divide in our education system, that all of our students have equitable access to the tools they need to learn and succeed even in an at-home learning environment,” said Churchill.

The province is also improving wireless connectivity and system stability at schools through the purchase and installation of new hardware including: firewalls, fibre-optic lines, servers and wireless routers.

Ten new full-time positions are being created to install and facilitate the upgrades.

The education minister said the majority of schools in Nova Scotia do have access to high-speed internet and those with slower speeds will be the target of the upgrades.

For students trying to complete their studies without high-speed access at their homes, Churchill offered a couple of alternatives to submit their work for evaluation.

“One option includes being able to utilize, by appointment, the school facility, even during a blended learning situation where they will have access to a safe learning space with internet and materials,” said Churchill.

The education minister said the program piloted in the spring, which allowed students to submit their work through a USB stick will also be available and those students will have access to devices with USB capabilities.

Should the province need to move to a blended model that would see some students move to at-home learning the biggest change will have nothing to do with technology.

“Everyone will be graded,” said Churchill. “That’s different from last year. We know that helps with motivation in terms of staying engaged with school work, even at home.”

The education minister said figuring out ways to educate in a pandemic has forced everyone to revaluate how things are done.

“That’s the silver lining here is this pandemic has forced us to take a real look at our tech capacity and assess who has access to digital learning tools and who doesn’t,” said Churchill. “I don’t see us moving back from this. In fact, I see us enhancing our ability to utilize technology in the learning environment at school and at home for the long run.”

Churchill said the upgrades have already begun and he hopes the work will be completed in every school in the province by the end of the school year.

Reported by Ed Halverson 
E-mail: edhalversonnews@gmail.com
Twitter: @edwardhalverson