(Laval) The Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, justified Thursday the use by public bodies of private medical services for their employees.
He was reacting to revelations that Hydro-Québec and Investissement Québec paid for teleconsultations in private medicine, in order to prevent their employees from wasting their time trying to obtain an appointment in the public network.
But for the Minister, there is no question of removing this privileged access to private services for employees of public bodies funded by taxpayers.
“These people have the right to have access,” pleaded Mr. Dubé, in a press scrum on the sidelines of the caucus of elected CAQists in Laval.
“We have an access problem at the moment in (the public health network), we are short of staff. If (these organizations) are able to offer benefits to their employees, to have better access to a health system, why take them away? »
Dialogue is among the companies that offer private medical teleconsultation services, accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Hydro-Quebec would pay between 2 and 4 million per year for their services, according to what revealed The Journal of Quebecwhile for Investissement Québec, the amount is much lower.
“Access is a priority for me and these people (private teleconsultation companies) who offer excellent service, can continue,” argued Mr. Dubé.
The minister suggested that the public network intends to offer the same type of teleconsultations through an application under development.
“We don’t want to stop Dialogue’s services while we prepare, we won’t cut a service for a few months,” he continued.