Health Minister Audrey Gordon appears to be in over her head.

It’s not just that her department seems to be grossly mismanaged right now, she’s struggling to answer even the most basic questions about her portfolio. On Wednesday, when reporters had a long list of questions, including about hospital capacity and pandemic restrictions, the minister could barely answer them.

Earlier today, Deputy Provincial Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Jazz Atwal announced that effective March 15, Manitobans will no longer have to self-isolate after testing positive for COVID-19. COVID-19 (the same day the wearing of the mask is lifted). It was a major announcement. Atwal, whose office falls under Gordon’s portfolio, unveiled the change during a Zoom press conference where reporters have a limited ability to ask follow-up questions and hold government officials accountable. Apparently, it’s safe enough to eliminate vaccination mandates and lift capacity limits, but it’s not safe enough for senior public health officials to hold in-person press conferences.

Gordon made herself available in person to answer these and other questions, but only for about seven minutes before her assistant, Draper Houston, took her away. Maybe it had something to do with the way she struggled in front of the microphone.

Gordon’s responses were clumsy and inarticulate. When asked why her government’s surgical wait times task force hadn’t provided an update since January (in December, Gordon promised monthly updates), she replied. that it was because they wanted to ensure that they were providing Manitobans with “substantial” information and did not want to give the public false hope.

If the government is making progress in reducing the surgical backlog, why should there be false hope? Is it because there has been no substantial progress to report in the past month?

No, Gordon said, the task force is making progress every day. However, she couldn’t tell what that progress was. To date, the task force has not yet released any targets or dates on when the backlogs will be eliminated.

If the government is making progress in reducing the surgical backlog, why should there be false hope? Is it because there has been no substantial progress to report in the past month?

The minister said the province is still finalizing “agreements” related to reducing waiting lists.

“Whether we’re able to report the deals being finalized depends on whether the ink has dried on those deals,” she said.

When will this ink be dry? Gordon wouldn’t say.

She also did not say, or know, whether surgical backlogs and wait times for other hospital procedures such as diagnostic tests continued to rise. Instead, she said she was eager to announce the award of a contract for a new centralized wait list management system. This system will allow the government to assess the “real” backlog, she said.

However, she did not know whether the backlog was increasing, leveling off or decreasing.

That’s the plan, let people get sick enough to need intensive care?

“We’re anticipating a slight increase in the number of cases,” she said when asked again, but lamented that “we don’t have that modeling from the federal or provincial government yet.”

The government therefore makes public health decisions without modelling.

And what is the plan if cases spike after March 15?

“Well, we’re looking at our ability to increase our critical care beds because as you know a lot of people over the last couple of years have been showing up in our critical care, so we’re planning…an orderly process to increase our number of intensive care beds if we need them,” Gordon said.

That’s it? That’s the plan, let people get sick enough to need intensive care?

What a train wreck.

tom.brodbeck@freepress.mb.ca

Tom Brodbeck
Journalist

Tom has covered Manitoba politics since the early 1990s and joined the Winnipeg Free Press news team in 2019.

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