‘It’s going to bankrupt health care’: Spending on temp agency nurses up more than 550% since pre-pandemic at one Toronto hospital network
‘It’s going to bankrupt health care’: Spending on temp agency nurses up more than 550% since pre-pandemic at one Toronto hospital network
More than 550 temp agency workers are now employed at a Toronto hospital, despite the city’s recent pandemic lockdown, creating what critics say is an untenable situation for hospital workers.
The city announced last week how it would try to keep the number of health care workers working at its hospitals to no more than 20 per cent of staff.
Toronto-Dominion Health (T-DHB) released a list last week of the hospitals it intends to prioritize, the number of which includes many of the city’s biggest, such as the Hospital for Sick Children, St. Michael’s Hospital and Toronto General hospital.
T-DHB announced on Friday it had hired more than 550 nurses, medical assistants and licensed practical nurses through a temp agency in the last 24 hours to help keep patients and staff safe, on top of a daily staff boost of 15 temporary nurses and 25 temporary medical assistants.
The agency workers have worked in hospital units, as well as in the emergency department and trauma center, since the city’s official coronavirus lockdown began on April 23, even though it is unclear whether they had had any contact with patients.
“The reason we have done this is because of the COVID-19 pandemic for the patients and staff, and also for other reasons,” T-DHB’s acting chief medical officer Dr. G. Murray Lipton said in an interview on Friday. “There is no question for us that there are a couple of hundred nurses and medical assistants who have been doing this work, and we are grateful
