RNAO and Canada's Speech from the Throne

In a letter to the Prime Minister, cabinet ministers and federal party leaders, RNAO calls for action to address some of the profound inequities laid bare by COVID-19, which has exposed our collective failure to build a country that provides health, safety and security for all. 

As we all know, the most vulnerable Canadians have been ready targets for COVID-19, in particular the elderly and the homeless, which we are urging be a central part of the government’s plan, outlined in the throne speech.  

Our failure to protect our seniors, who all across this country have succumbed to COVID-19, must be addressed. The time for reports describing and decrying the dire national situation in long-term care homes is over, and action must be taken through national standards. We implore the Prime Minister and all MPs to put their support behind RNAO’s Nursing Home Basic Care Guarantee as a national standard in response to this crisis in the provision of safe care for Canada’s seniors.

Likewise, people experiencing homelessness are more vulnerable to illness and disease than the housed. Public health advice has reinforced the importance of housing as a defence against COVID-19. “Stay home, self-isolate, wash hands frequently,” has been the constant refrain for months. Yet each year, nearly 250,000 Canadians experience homelessness – 35,000 on any given night. Homelessness is the product of decades of public policy choices by all orders of government, and is simply not acceptable in a country as wealthy as ours. RNAO is asking government to adopt the six point Recovery For All plan of the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness (CAEH).

Nurses have been central in the critical, brutal and unrelenting work to prevent the spread of COVID-19, and to care for those most vulnerable to the disease.  RNAO is advising the federal government to end this year, the Year of the Nurse, by re-instating a national chief nursing officer. As is well-recognized, chief nursing officers play a critical role in focusing attention on social determinants of health, transforming health policies, improving health outcomes, health human resources planning and advancing health systems.

RNAO has outlined the solutions to challenges that are facing Canadians in these unprecedented times. The association is calling for immediate action to address the multiple threats to life, health, safety and security currently plaguing us all. We are asking that you, too, call on government to act – with urgency – to provide health, safety and security for all.

Download the full letter