File photo of the Alberta legislature building in Edmonton (Lethbridge News Now)
Proposed legislation aims to improve Alberta’s health care system
Apr 8, 2021 | 3:20 PM
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EDMONTON, AB – The province has proposed legislative changes aimed at strengthening the health care system.
Bill 65, the Health Statutes Amendment Act, Spring 2021, focuses on increasing system efficiencies, adapting and responding to changing needs in the province, and “ensuring public dollars are used wisely”.
Highlights of Bill 65 include:
- Enhancing the responsibility and accountability to ensure pharmacy owners, regardless of the ownership model, are accountable for the care that the pharmacy provides to Albertans.
- Reducing red tape for pharmacies and supporting an evolving pharmacy environment and system.
- Enabling expanded access to pharmacy services for herd animals and clarifying that pharmacists and pharmacy technicians are able to provide pharmacy services to companion animals.
- The province says this would provide Albertans who raise or own herd animals with options to access pharmacy services for animals previously enabled under the Food and Drug Act prior to changes made by the federal government in 2018.
- Providing judges at fatality inquiries with access to facts and information from health system quality assurance committees to support more comprehensive reviews, discussions and effective recommendations.
- Adding a provision so when government joins an injured claimant’s lawsuit that ultimately ends up being unsuccessful, government is only responsible to pay the additional, reasonable costs related directly to recovering the cost of health services provided to the injured claimant.
- Reducing red tape and enabling late-filing penalties for auto insurers to be waived in extraordinary circumstances, such as a natural disaster, that prevent them from meeting deadlines to file reports.
