The costs of extra masks and other protective gear are starting to add up for private-sector health-care providers across Canada, so much so that some are worried about going out of business.
Canadian Federation of Independent Business’ latest survey shows that 88 per cent of doctors who work outside of provincial health-care systems are concerned about how much they’ll have to spend on PPE.
Nearly half of those surveyed say they expect to have problems with the supply of PPE in the future.
Annie Dormuth, CFIB Alberta provincial affairs director, said that the costs are necessary so that doctors can safely see patients.
“These businesses are operating under new requirements that some would almost say are the equivalent to what someone would see in a hospital setting, without any of the additional supports that the public health system gets,” said Dormuth.
CFIB’s survey also asked owners how they felt about their ability to remain profitable in a post-COVID-19 world.
Seventy-five per cent of respondents said they are worried that their business will not be financially viable and 16 per cent are already considering bankruptcy.
Provincial PPE program
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Alberta government was providing PPE to all medical professionals at a subsidized cost.
On May 25, the cost for PPE obtained through the province was raised to the market price, and on July 1, all private community-based health-service providers had to start finding their own supply of PPE.
CFIB is asking provincial governments to once again allow access to PPE through its supply chains.
On June 29, the province announced the Small and Medium Enterprise Relaunch Grant, which will give businesses up to $5,000 to offset costs due to the pandemic.
Those funds can go towards extra cleaning supplies, physical barriers, PPE, rent, wages and inventory.
Global News reached out to Alberta Health to see if any health-care-specific changes were coming to the PPE program but it did not respond by the time of publication.
– With files from Global News’ Allison Bench