Women are Saying:

• Homecare assessments are not being done in a timely fashion, as waiting lists for assessment are enormous.

• Reduced homecare services have caused a decrease in the physical status of women and more dependency on the care provider.

• Women are having to give up job opportunities to care for the sick and elderly at home.

• Care providers are being asked to do tasks outside of their job description like housework, as there are no supports for individuals in the home.

• Frequent changes in caregivers are hard on the elderly and mental health patients.

• Reporting is not done well when various and numerous caregivers are allocated to one patient.

• Individuals that are chronically ill, last year received 5-6 hours of home care per week, they now receive 1-2 hours per week due to cuts to funding.

Homecare and Women

What's happened?

Hospital restructuring has moved patients out of hospitals "Quicker and Sicker". The burden of care has moved to the home without adequate supports. The Provincial Conservative government forced competitive bidding" opening the door to for-profit corporations to win contracts for homecare. As a result, the Victorian Order of Nurses and Red Cross have closed their non-profit services in many areas of Ontario. Now many services are run by for-profit corporations.

• Caps have been put on the amount of homecare that women can access.

• "Competitive Bidding" for homecare contracts created great instability and drove down working conditions in the health care sector leading to massive staffing shortages and forcing many women workers to find new jobs.

• Women that are elderly, chronically ill and disabled have been shifted to the bottom of waiting lists for care as those who would have formerly been in hospital were moved onto homecare.

• Homecare services now have to deal with a bigger patient load with more complex care needs.

• The burden of care has been shifted onto families (mainly women), volunteers and unpaid caregivers.

• Homecare budgets were frozen at rates below documented population need.

• Homecare was privatized and is now delivered mainly by for-profit companies.

• Community boards and memberships were wiped out and replaced with government appointees to silence criticism.

What Women Want:

• Homecare needs to be covered by the principles of public Medicare.

• Homecare funding needs to be based on population need not arbitrary caps.

• Support services for women that are elderly, chronically ill and women with disabilities needs to be reinstated.

• Competitive bidding and privatization of homecare must stop. Funding should go to non-profit care, not to for-profit corporations.

• Women as patients, caregivers, and workers need to be consulted on changes to homecare.

• Special attention must be given to the needs of ethno-cultural minorities, poor women, disabled and senior women and marginalized women.

• Democratic Community governance of homecare should be reinstated.

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Listen Up! Women and the Future of Medicare

The last decade has seen dramatic changes to the basic structure of Medicare and its delivery. Women, as the majority of caregivers, frontline health care worker and as patients have felt the brunt of these changes, through privatization, de-regulation, cuts and downloading of care. The Ontario Health Coalition has created this project "Listen Up! Women and the Future of Medicare" to help engage women in the debate about the future of Medicare.

Listen Up! Women and the Future of Medicare project has been funded by the Status of Women Canada, Women's Program. This document expresses the views and opinions of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official policy or opinion of Status of Women Canada or the Government of Canada. All photos were taken without the expectation of privacy