There are 3 truths about Canadian healthcare that the public will acknowledge in the next two years:

1. Healthcare is collapsing across Canada because of decisions to underfund it over the past two decades.

For folks who say it’s unsustainable, we’ve been saying that for 30 years. Underfunding was not the solution to that problem.

The solution was (and still is!) making deliberate choices of what public healthcare is and isn’t (which we haven’t done either), linked to what we publicly fund and what we don’t.

We then have to regulate both of those markets effectively. 2. The only folks who can reverse this collapse are politicians who hold the purse strings and have the power to change policies and regulations to guide different activity in the health system towards something better.

Going it alone has never helped. Working together does. This idea of provincial/territorial vs federal sandboxes makes no sense when you look at what’s worked in the past - FPT levels working together.

Canadians want care no matter where they go in the country, not just where their postal code is.

There are respectful ways of working together obviously and sides need to not act unilaterally, but they do need to act.

If one side telegraphs publicly what they’re planning to do over years and then does it, I don’t think that’s acting unilaterally. That’s making sure action gets done and socializing it.

Today I was ratified as @CMA_Docs President-Elect, the beginning of three years supporting and leading the national organization that unifies Canadian physicians.

ctvnews.ca/mobile/health/…

/1 I’m the first Indigenous and Pacific Islander in this position. @CashinMD is the first Indigenous Board member this year.

I’ve been asked many times about what being in this position means in the context of being Indigenous. Recent #CMAagm has consolidated a few thoughts.

/2

I've been reading around #gaslighting lately. For those new to the term, it's a type of manipulation where seeds of doubt are planted within a targeted individual or group, making them question their own memory, perception, or judgment.
1/17 In 2018, @InsideCdnNurse invited me to write about reconciliation. Looking back with my current perspective, I've realized that what I actually wrote about were the effects of #gaslighting on the stories passed on to me by my father and grandparents.

canadian-nurse.com/en/articles/is…
2/17

1. Agree @kimkellymd, equity, diversity and inclusion cannot be achieved without deliberate sponsorship and mentorship. Although I can’t speak to the experience of identifying as a woman, I can speak to my own experience as an Indigenous physician. Beginning of a thread.

https://twitter.com/KimKellyMD/status/1336015875837607937

2. My ancestry is Anishinaabe, Cree, Metis and Polynesian. My extended family survived residential school and the sixties scoop. I was the first person in my family to consider medicine as a career.

1/ Beginning of a long thread.

Yesterday a CBC report noted that myself and a surgical colleague reported the hanging of a noose in June 2016. Thank you to everyone who has sent me supportive messages and phone calls since the story was published. It means a lot.

https://twitter.com/charlesrusnell/status/1279074470150369280

2/ I have spoken out about racism, discrimination and bias for almost 20 years. There are many within AHS that have championed this message, including our CEO who amplified this message (and me) both when she was over PPIH and in her current role.

cbc.ca/player/play/24…