When the late Tom Maccagno, a former Lac La Biche mayor, lawyer, environmental champion and local historian was forced to travel two or three times a week to St. Paul for the region’ s only dialysis treatment, we followed him, tracking his ordeal in a photo and video essay. We used that coverage to challenge the government to bring the service to the growing amount of patients in the Lac La Biche and Plamondon region who needed the life-saving procedure.
The community now has a bus that serves the region, thanks to the efforts of then-MLA Ray Danyluk, countless community supporters and local municipal politicians past and present.
But we want more. We need more.
Oddly, back in 2010 when the government agreed to fund the dialysis service to the area, the Minister of Health at the time thought we were getting a permanent dialysis unit in our hospital. He was of the understanding that budgets had been finalized for the unit. When the POST contacted his office, he was very surprised to hear that a touring bus was going to be providing the service on a part-time basis.
The fact that he thought it was a done deal has stuck with some of us at the POST.
If the money and the will was apparently in place back in 2010, why are we still inching towards the solution?
In 2012, again due to public outcry, and an increasing number of area residents needing the treatments, we were told the bus would stay in our community full time. Great. But we need more. We should have had more.
