By Paul Chesser on 6.11.09 @ 3:07PM
Looks like public hospitals in British Columbia, Canada, will
have to cut patient services in order to comply with global
warming laws established by the provincial government.
Looks like public hospitals in British Columbia, Canada, will
have to cut patient services in order to comply with global
warming laws established by the provincial government. The Surrey
Leader
reports:
The Lower Mainland’s health authorities will have to dig
more than $4 million a year out of their already stretched
budgets to pay B.C.’s carbon tax and offset their carbon
footprints.
Critics say the payments mean the government’s strategy to
fight climate change will further exacerbate a crisis in health
funding.
“You have public hospitals cutting services to pay a tax
that goes to another 100 per cent government-owned agency,” NDP
health critic Adrian Dix said.
“That just doesn’t make sense.”
The Fraser Health Authority will pay $616,000 in carbon tax
this year, rising to $821,000 next year, officials there
said.
And by 2010 Fraser will also be paying $1.3 million a year
to the province’s Pacific Carbon Trust to offset its projected
52,600 tonnes of carbon emissions released….
Vancouver Coastal Health Authority also expects its costs
will be close to $2 million next year in combined carbon tax
and offset payments.
And while human life is threatened, of course, the stated
objective of global warming kooks is once again undermined:
Dix warned that some of the potential cuts – such as
closing the ER at Mission Memorial Hospital – would actually
increase carbon emissions by sending patients further
afield.
“Obviously when you shut down regional centres it makes
people travel farther to get to their health care facility,” he
said.
Meanwhile a hospital executive states his greater concern for
plant life than heartbeats:
Vancouver Coastal chief financial officer Duncan Campbell
said his health authority believes the payments are appropriate
and isn’t asking for any exemption from Victoria.
“For us to go back and ask for an exemption wouldn’t fit in
well with our green care plans,” he said.
Did they hire this guy away from Planned Parenthood?
Cross-posted
at Globalwarming.org.
topics:
Health Care, Global Warming
