New Brunswick’s premiere says a number of images exhibiting an aged affected person’s placement in a hospital provide room are “heartbreaking,” however Blaine Higgs argues his authorities’s huge price range surplus would not essentially deal with the difficulty.

Karen Totten was shocked when she found her mom, Irene MacNeill, had been re-located to a provide room inside an overcrowded Saint John Regional Hospital on Thursday.

MacNeil has been within the hospital since September and is ready for a long-term care mattress to turn into accessible.

The images, posted on social media by Totten, have been shared throughout the nation.

“We have had some unlucky conditions and we all know that,” says Higgs. “I actually really feel for certain the affected person, the mom and the daughter. However I additionally must say that I do know that health-care professionals are doing their perfect to attempt to put folks and hold folks within the locations the place they’re wanted most.”

Totten says she does not blame the nurses or medical doctors for her mom’s relocation. As an alternative, Totten places the onus on Higgs and says he ought to be directing extra of the province’s rising surplus to well being care.

“We have now some huge cash in New Brunswick,” says Totten. “A surplus, proper? How come? As a result of they are not utilizing it the place it ought to be.”

Higgs says spending extra money on well being care may not be efficient.

“I’ve mentioned over and over that we’ll put cash into something that is going to get higher outcomes for sufferers,” says Higgs. “However what we at all times have discovered, or not at all times have discovered, however many occasions we have discovered we put extra money into it however we do not see any outcomes.”

Cecile Cassista, govt director of the New Brunswick Coalition for Seniors and Nursing Dwelling Residents’ Rights, disagrees with Higgs.

“Cash does a part of the issue and he is aware of what the issue is,” says Cassista, mentioning employees shortages and mattress closures. “I name upon him to share that surplus. We have a disaster and he wants to acknowledge that.”

In a written assertion, Horizon says sufferers are generally moved to “non-traditional care areas’ when there’s overcrowding in a facility.

The well being authority would not touch upon any particular case. Interim Horizon CEO Margaret Melanson wasn’t made accessible for an interview Monday.

Cassista applauded Karen Totten for sharing the images publicly.

“Households are afraid to talk out, and I get that,” says Cassista.