My question is to the Premier.

CTV News reported yesterday that a four-year-old with Down syndrome spent 40 hours in the ER of Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital before she was finally transferred to a bed. The child’s mother, Jasmine, was forced to create a makeshift bed out of chairs for her exhausted and sick daughter, who was suffering with a fever, vomiting and had low oxygen levels.

Our youngest children are sick and suffering because this government didn’t do enough to prepare for this crisis.

I ask the Premier, how many more kids will have to wait long hours for care before this government takes action to relieve the burden on hospitals and ensure our kids get the care that they need?

Why didn’t the Premier tell people during the recent election campaign that he’d be undermining democracy as part of his program?

The government has been completely ineffective. At SickKids, children going to the hospital are very sick. More than half the kids in their ICU are on ventilators. Over the weekend, the CEO of SickKids said, “So far none have died, thank God.”

Speaker, I have a really hard time understanding how this government allowed the situation to get so bad that the CEO of this province’s premier children’s hospital is thanking God that no kid has died. To the Premier: Why didn’t the government act sooner and effectively to avert the crisis?

To the Premier: For months, health care professionals have raised concerns about hospitals’ capacity to respond to the early respiratory illness season that we are seeing this year. Despite the alarm bells, this government sat on their hands and did nothing. Today, ER wait times at children’s hospitals are unseasonably high, pediatric ICUs are over capacity and children are being transferred to adult hospitals. Why has the government ignored the growing crisis in Ontario’s children’s hospitals?

We all have a role to play in protecting children from severe illness, especially the government. Why hasn’t this government responded effectively to the acute pressures on our children’s hospitals and increasing demand for pediatric ICU beds?

My question is to the Premier. Records from Ontario Health show 1,400 people died while waiting for surgery last year. That’s a 43% increase compared to pre-pandemic years and a 30% increase over just a year before. When lives hang in the balance, why is the Premier refusing to invest in recruiting, retaining and respecting health care workers?

The staffing crisis is costing people their lives. Why is this government planning to spend money on privatization that will bleed even more staff from our hospitals?

We have a hospital staffing crisis. Privatization would siphon staff out of our hospitals and send them to a for-profit system. Why is this government planning to spend money on privatization that would make the hospital staffing crisis even worse?