Health care was at the centre of P.E.I. Premier Dennis King’s state of the province address Monday evening, and it included a promise to move long-term care patients out of hospitals and into more appropriate beds.
King, as is customary on the Island, made his address to the Rotary Club.
The premier started his address with an acknowledgement that the province had been through a difficult time in the pandemic, and he included himself in that. The Dennis King of 2024 is still feeling the impact of pandemic isolation, he said, and public speaking does not come as easily to him as it did in 2019.
“Enduring what we have endured has changed us,” King said.
In his state-of-the-province address, Premier Dennis King says there is no going back to normal.
“It’s important to recognize those feelings you have, that sense of worry, that sense of angst, that apprehension. It’s not just you. It’s the person beside you, it’s the person in front of you, it’s the person behind you.”
1,000 Islanders to come off patient registry
Having said that, King went on to outline ways in which the province has come out of the pandemic well, with strong economic growth.
And he talked at length about health care.
The system needs to change, he said, and that change can be slow. But after five years in power, he said the investments his government is making are beginning to pay off.
He announced that after more than a decade of watching the number of Islanders without access to primary care — to a family physician or nurse practitioner — grow, that number would fall in February.
“About 1,000 Islanders will come off the patient registry this month. This month, February 2024, will
