Parents feeling ‘abandoned’ as children’s health-care system struggles, calls for provincial mask mandate swell

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As a mom of younger kids, Ottawa’s Cassie Smith is effectively conscious of the extraordinary pressures going through CHEO proper now. So, when her 18-month-old daughter developed a excessive fever final week, Smith rigorously adopted the kids’s hospital’s steerage so she might safely look after her daughter with out going to the overburdened emergency room.

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Mother and father like Smith have been taking to social media in the hunt for recommendation and assist to cope with very sick kids throughout a time when kids’s ache drugs are in brief provide and the kids’s well being system is struggling. Many dad and mom say they’re overwhelmed and terrified their kids will turn into critically sick.

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Within the case of Smith’s daughter, when remedy appeared to turn into much less efficient after 4 days of sickness as she was in misery and her fever peaked at 40 levels Celsius, Smith grew to become actually apprehensive.

Since her household doctor’s workplace was booked for the day, Smith once more took steerage from CHEO’s web site and known as Well being Join Ontario, a provincial distant well being recommendation service previously known as Telehealth Ontario.

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First, she stuffed out a web-based kind, after which somebody known as her again to ask for extra particulars about her daughter’s sickness. When Smith mentioned she wish to communicate to a nurse, the particular person on the road informed her one could be in contact.

That was Wednesday, Nov. 9. As of early this week, she had nonetheless not heard from a nurse.

Smith is lucky that her toddler started to enhance later within the week and the disaster handed. If it had not, she would have doubtless ended up in a crowded emergency division ready room at CHEO, regardless of her greatest efforts to keep away from such a scenario.

“It’s actually essential to us, we attempt the whole lot that we are able to to each maintain our children protected and never expose them to what could also be on the hospital, but in addition to cut back the pressures on the health-care system which is having a tough time,” she mentioned.

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Ministry of well being spokesperson Invoice Campbell mentioned the period of time customers watch for Well being Join Ontario can fluctuate, however most requests are fulfilled inside a couple of minutes or as much as no quite a lot of hours, even throughout peak service. He steered Smith fill out a suggestions kind to get a glance into her particular name.

Smith mentioned she is apprehensive the Well being Join Ontario system shouldn’t be functioning correctly, including to strain on hospitals akin to CHEO.

However Smith additionally feels that the message from the province’s Chief Medical Officer of Well being this week that folks ought to put on masks inside their properties to maintain their kids from changing into sick is placing the blame on dad and mom and never addressing the well being disaster.

“I’m not the one bringing sickness into this home. It’s daycare and elsewhere. (Provincial authorities officers) must have a way of containing the unfold,” she mentioned.

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“I feel a masks mandate is a very easy answer and the truth that they will’t do this for youngsters is horrifying. We really feel deserted.”

Barrhaven mother Emilia Ajzerle additionally has a narrative that’s acquainted to oldsters of younger kids throughout town — and province.

Her son Anteo, 7, and daughter Aria, 4, have been each very sick with a respiratory virus early final week.

“I’ve by no means had my youngsters that sick earlier than of their life,” she mentioned.

Each kids had fevers spiking to 40 levels for a couple of week and developed harsh coughs. They misplaced their urge for food and power.

Even with remedy, her son was crying in ache, Ajzerle mentioned in an interview on Monday.

“(Sunday), he didn’t transfer from the sofa in any respect.”

As a result of there was a scarcity of ache remedy for youngsters for months, Alzerle had bought some in the summertime simply in case.

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However by the tip of final week, after her daughter had been sick for almost per week and her son additionally caught the virus, they ran out of ache remedy. Her husband and in-laws started driving throughout Ottawa and Gatineau to pharmacies trying to find extra.

Some pharmacists are holding kids’s ache remedy behind the counter, apparently to forestall individuals from shopping for giant portions.

Her husband positioned the final bottle of ache remedy obtainable on the time at a pharmacy in Gatineau, behind the counter, mentioned Ajzerle.

In the meantime, she was unable to e-book a go to with the household physician all week as a result of there have been no appointments obtainable.

At one level, she mentioned, her daughter was in a lot ache she thought-about heading to CHEO.

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“I caught my daughter within the bathtub whereas she was screaming as a result of she was so scorching and couldn’t take the ache.”

She mentioned she known as CHEO for recommendation and was informed that the particular person talking couldn’t inform her whether or not or to not head there, and mentioned to test the hospital’s web site.

The wait time at CHEO’s emergency division was about seven hours on the time. “My husband was like, ‘let’s simply wait yet one more day.’”

Ajzerle phoned Well being Care Join and was informed viral sicknesses final seven to 10 days and that antibiotics don’t assist if it’s viral.

She additionally turned to a mothers’ group on Fb for recommendation. Fellow mothers supplied sympathy, recommendation and related tales.

Ajzerle mentioned her daughter started to enhance simply as her son headed into the worst stage of his week-long sickness.

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Her daughter is feeling high quality and went again to high school, whereas her son remains to be on the mend.

Many dad and mom concern what comes subsequent because the historic viral season continues.

Smith mentioned after two and a half years of the pandemic, it feels as if many individuals are “having a standard life,” however dad and mom of younger kids are shut of their homes with their youngsters, sick and pressured.

She has been house lately with a second sick baby, her five-year-old. Smith fears when she returns to work, her kids will turn into sick once more.

“I wore a masks to present start to my child. I’ll put on a masks, that isn’t a tough factor for me to do. However that isn’t the purpose, we have to defend them earlier than it will get to them.”