“They aren’t nursing ‘homes’, they are institutions. They aren’t long-term ‘care’ facilities, they are institutions. End the euphemisms. These are institutions.” ~ Gabrielle Peters, 2020
Ontario Advocacy Consortium Press Statement on Nursing Home Closures in Toronto
July 10, 2024
A sixth long-term care institution has closed in Toronto. The writing is on the wall. The days of institutionalizing people because of age and disability are long gone. It is time the Ontario government recognized this and supported this Consortium’s calls to redirect the funding for the closed institutions to non-profit, community-based alternatives.
Almost four years ago, our member organization Seniors for Social Action Ontario warned the Ford government that it could not build its way out of the long-term care crisis. It recommended a range of in-home and residential alternatives to building more long-term care institutions. The Ontario government largely ignored those recommendations.
More recently this Consortium submitted a brief to the Ford government recommending a range of alternatives to building more institutions and urged the redirection of funding to support people with disabilities of all ages in their own homes and communities. https://www.seniorsactionontario.com/_files/ugd/50033d_e809487548d1451f88662ca552889b87.pdf
With the closure of these six facilities in Toronto, Ontario now has over $47 million a year that it could re-invest in the alternatives to institutions outlined below. In our view, real and meaningful investment in these ways forward would bring about better care for people with disabilities and seniors across the Province, better support families, and ensure better wages and conditions for care workers.
The way forward should be clear by now. Fund these alternatives to institutions:
● Intensive in-home support, palliative care, and hospital at home programs tied to individuals’ needs not bureaucratic requirements;
● Expanded and more accessible direct funding through the Family Managed Home Care program so that individuals and families can organize their own supports;
● Paid Family Caregivers so that families can care for their own loved ones without suffering undue financial hardship;
● PACE (Program of All Inclusive Care of the Elderly) programs that bring integrated services to where elders and people with disabilities live in community housing and seniors’ buildings;
● Hub and Spoke programs that provide 16-24 hour a day case management and system navigation support in buildings where a large demographic of older adults and people with disabilities live and in the surrounding areas;
● Staff residential programs in the community Supported Independent Living to provide staffing where people live in apartments, condos, and small community residences – fully staffed 24/7.
● An Adult Community Service Worker Program to provide system navigation and advocacy support for individuals and families.
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