“When I started this work, my vision for myself and my country was that every Canadian would not just have access to emergency medical care, but quality access. I dedicated 34 years of my life to that goal,” Dr. Drummond said. “Let’s declare this to be the crisis it is. Let’s admit the obvious threat to services for millions of Canadians.”

The system has particularly failed to nurture its emergency medicine nurse colleagues, Dr. Drummond added. “We tell them to shut up and work, never paying a dime more than necessary, not treating emergency nursing as a specialty. If they get punched by a patient, we say: ‘What did you do to deserve it?’” Historical wrongs like this have permeated nursing, he said, and then along came COVID-19. Nurses, realizing that they were just cogs in the wheel, said they were done with it and found other jobs. But Dr. Drummond believes they might come back if they sensed that their working conditions would be improved, because practicing emergency medicine can get in your blood.

Larry Beresford is a freelance medical journalist based in Oakland, Calif., with a specialty in hospice and palliative care and thorough experience covering hospital medicine.

References

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