PART 2
NEW BRUNSWICK
(Special Benefits Insurance Services, n.d.)
(If you have not yet read Part 1, you can find it here)
In New Brunswick
New
Brunswick is a small province of 747,101 residents as of 2016. (Statistics
Canada, 2018). As the only official bilingual province in Canada, the province
determined it to be necessary to have two health systems within itself that
catered to the linguistic needs of its population. Horizon Health Network was
established to provide healthcare services to mainly Anglophones (with
bilingual capabilities) while the Vitalité Health Network provides services to
Francophones.
According to
their respective websites, “Horizon Health Network (Horizon) operates 12
hospitals and more than 100 medical facilities, clinics and offices throughout
New Brunswick." (Horizon Health Network, n.d.).
“Vitalité
Health Network is a regional health authority providing and managing health
care and services in an area covering northern and southeastern New Brunswick.
The Network is the only Francophone managed organization of its kind in the
country and has nearly 60 points of service providing a range of health care
and services to members of the public in the official language of their
choice.” (Vitalité Health Network, n.d.).
Unfortunately,
in recent times, the province has been plagued by a decreasing and aging
population, with a reduction in population of almost 4000 persons between 2011
and 2016. Whereas, the overall population of Canada increased from 33,476,688
to 35,151,728 during that time. (Statistics Canada, 2018).Tony
Tremblay states
“New Brunswick’s status as a “have-not” province—a province
that receives equalization payments from wealthier “have” provinces to offset
its fiscal incapacities—means that its ability to meet the goal of universality
as outlined in the Canada Health Act is especially challenging…The implications
of this fact in New Brunswick and other have-not provinces for physician and medical
staffing, infrastructure and equipment costs, health education and research,
and other aspects of health, widely defined, are staggering. Provinces with the
fewest resources are expected to deliver services that are the equivalent of
provinces with the most.” (Tremblay, 2017).
For a
province with limited resources, mostly rural communities and a higher than
average elderly population, the effects on overall health have proven
significant. In a paper published in the Journal of New Brunswick Studies, Paul
Peters shows “Provincially, New Brunswick fares poorer than the national
average on several key population and health indicators: post-secondary
graduates, long-term unemployment, reliance on government transfers, high and
growing old-age dependency, total age-standardized mortality rate,
self-perceived health, proportion of overweight and obese, diabetes, and ACS
conditions.”(Peters, 2017).
However, it
is important to note that within the province itself, larger cities like
Fredericton, Saint John and Moncton (and their surrounding areas) were overall
deemed to have better health based on the determinants evaluated, including self-perceived
health.
In my
opinion, perhaps this gives us an idea as to why New Brunswick (as well as the
other Atlantic provinces) seems to be unhealthier than larger provinces like
Ontario and Alberta despite those provinces having far larger and more diverse populations.
Just as larger cities within the province have been determined to have better
overall health and smaller ones.
It seems
that education and economic status, technology, social and physical environments
and other determinants that vary differently between urban and rural
communities do account for a better determination of health.
References
Horizon
Health Network. (n.d.). About Us. Retrieved from http://en.horizonnb.ca/home/about-us.aspx
Peters, P.
(2017). Population Change and Population Health: A Spatio-temporal Analysis of
New Brunswick Communities.Journal of New Brunswick Studies / Revue d’études
sur le Nouveau-Brunswick, 8. Retrieved from https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/JNBS/article/view/25881/30033
Special
Benefits Insurance Services. New Brunswick Health Insurance [Image].
Retrieved from https://www.sbis.ca/new-brunswick-health-insurance.html
Statistics
Canada. (2018). Census Profile, 2016
Census. Retrieved from https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2016/dp-pd/prof/details/Page.cfm?Lang=E&Geo1=PR&Code1=13&Geo2=&Code2=&Data=Count&SearchText=New%20Brunswick&SearchType=Begins&SearchPR=01&B1=All&GeoLevel=PR&GeoCode=13
Tremblay, T.
(2017). Health Care in New Brunswick: The Elephant in the Room (as if we needed
another elephant). Journal of New
Brunswick Studies / Revue d’études sur le Nouveau-Brunswick, 8. Retrieved
from https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/JNBS/article/view/25875/30021
Vitalité
Health Network. (n.d.). Who are we. Retrieved from
https://www.vitalitenb.ca/en/who-are-we
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