October 26, 2015 - 16:10 — Timothy Gillespie
On Monday afternoon, Water Street in front of Shelburne Town Hall was packed with more than 200 citizens demonstrating their displeasure at the crisis of closures of the emergency room at Roseway Hospital - more than 500 hours in the past year.The timing of the demonstration was designed to match that of the visit to Town Hall of health & Wellness minister Leo Glavine.
The minister was in town to discuss with municipal leaders the on-going struggle to keep the doors of the ER open. The ER has suffered dozens of closures in past months, resulting in patients having to drive an hour or more to Yarmouth or Liverpool.
Mayor Karen mattatall told CBC news that, ""I personally find it offensive that we have been begging — that we have been relegated, I should say — to begging the province to do their job by just keeping our ER open."
Many of the demonstrators carried hand-made signs, with slogans such as "Keep Shelburne County ER open".
Several businesses allowed employees to attend the event as part of their work day.
Queens-Shelburne MLA Sterling Belliveau was there. Earlier in the day, Belliveau issued a news release in which he stated that health care in Shelburne County was suffering as a result of inaction by Glavine's department.
Shelburne Town councilor Roy O'Donnell helped promote the event and was very pleased with the turnout. O'Donnell told SCT that the meeting with the minister and Nova Scotia health Authority CEO Janet Knox was very productive and was attended by representatives of every municipal unit in the county except the Municipality of Barrington.
"The minister listened to what we had to say very intently," said O'Donnell, "and everyone got to speak their piece."
O'Donnell said that Knox told the councilors, mayors and wardens that efforts are now underway to alleviate the closures of Roseway ER and that work would begin on the new medical centre in spring of 2016. When the Centre opens, Knox told the assembly, there should be a lessening of ER closures.
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