Harper extends northern health program

“This is about working with the territories”

By SPECIAL TO NUNATSIAQ NEWS

Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq were joined in Yellowknife Aug. 25 by all three premiers of the territories in extending the territorial health system sustainability initiative for an additional two years. The extension, which runs from 2012-2014, will help address some hurdles faced by northern residents when dealing with medical situations and daily health requirements. (PHOTO COURTESY OF THE PMO)


Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq were joined in Yellowknife Aug. 25 by all three premiers of the territories in extending the territorial health system sustainability initiative for an additional two years. The extension, which runs from 2012-2014, will help address some hurdles faced by northern residents when dealing with medical situations and daily health requirements. (PHOTO COURTESY OF THE PMO)

POSTMEDIA NEWS

YELLOWKNIFE — Prime Minister Stephen Harper continued his tour of the North Thursday by announcing the extension of a health program available to residents of Canada’s three territories.

Harper and Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq were joined at Yellowknife’s Stanton Territorial Hospital by all three premiers of the territories in extending the territorial health system sustainability initiative for an additional two years that will help deal with some hurdles faced by northern residents when dealing with medical situations and daily health requirements.

“This is about working with the territories to ensure northern families can get the medical attention they need near their homes, thereby reducing the costs, time and travel of being treated further south,” Harper said in a statement.

The two-year extension will see an extra $60 million given to the initiative, with a goal of addressing mental health and chronic disease strategies, improving monitoring and medical reporting, improving medical transportation services, and dealing with shortfalls in human resources in the health sector in the North.

The program, which was first established in 2005 with $150 million funding for five years, also received an additional $60 million over two years in the 2010 federal budget. This latest announcement extends the arrangement from 2012 to 2014.

The health initiative is controlled by a group of federal and territorial health representatives.

Harper is in the midst of a week-long tour in the North — his sixth annual end-of-summer visit to the region — that was delayed by a fatal plane crash last weekend in Resolute Bay, that left 12 people dead and three injured.

On Aug. 24, Harper visited Agnico-Eagle’s Meadowbank gold mine near Baker Lake.

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