'Systemic ageism' to blame for CHSLD deaths during pandemic's first wave, says expert

"Systemic ageism" and outdated facilities created "a perfect storm" in long-term care facilities, according to an expert who testified Monday at coroner Gehane Kamel's hearings on the deaths of elderly or vulnerable people in residential settings during the first wave of COVID-19.

"The CHSLDs were in the blind spot of this crisis," said Dr. Réjean Hébert, the former health minister under the Pauline Marois government. 

The specialist in gerontology, now a professor of health policy evaluation at the Université de Montreal, recalled that "almost 10 per cent of patients in CHSLDs died of COVID-19" during the first wave -- a rate five times greater than that of Canada.

He explained this "death toll" by the fact that care for the elderly is "the poor relation" of the health care system, despite an increasingly aging population.

Even before the pandemic, "there was a shift to other priorities," creating "an insufficient ratio of nurses" and "an exodus of doctors," according to Hébert. As a result, CHSLDs were not able to provide acute care, so patients in distress were transferred to hospital, a move that was often "extremely difficult" for those with cognitive impairments.