Transfer of Sask. COVID-19 ICU patients to Ontario ends as final person returns home
CBC
After nearly two months, Saskatchewan's transfer of critically ill COVID-19 patients to Ontario for intensive care has come to an end.
On Tuesday, the province confirmed that the final ICU patient airlifted to Ontario had returned home earlier that day.
It's the end of a policy that produced heart-wrenching stories from the families left behind in Saskatchewan and tragic endings for those who didn't come home alive.
While the transfer program has come to an end, many questions remain about the policy, including the total cost of the airlift.
The decision to airlift patients suffering from COVID-19 came during the peak of the fourth wave of COVID-19 cases in Saskatchewan.
The provincial government transferred the first patient to Ontario on Oct. 18, as it struggled to deal with a record number of intensive care patients.
The province reported 335 COVID-19-related hospitalizations that day, including 85 in intensive care units.
Normally, Saskatchewan only has 79 ICU beds.
But the peak of the fourth wave was far from normal.
Saskatchewan was forced to halt many non-essential services, including surgeries and organ donation, in order to shift health-care workers to deal with the surging number of cases.
WATCH | Sask. family frustrated after 5-day wait for return of father's body from Ontario:
Even those decisions were not enough, and Saskatchewan was forced to eventually airlift a total of 27 patients to Ontario.
Only 21 of the patients would come home, with six dying in Ontario as a result of COVID-19.
They included people like Ken Millar, whose family waited five days for their father's body to be returned from Ontario, and Dr. Yousself Al-Begamy.
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