The United Conservative Party Government wants the restructured Alberta Heath Services (AHS) to be known as Alberta Health & Hospitality Services (AHHS), AlbertaPolitics.ca has learned.
In addition, the province is said to be looking at a strategic partnership with a U.S. motel chain to open facilities that can be used to provide continuing-care services in communities throughout Alberta.
“I’m pretty sure they were close to a deal with Rainbow Motels,” someone we talked to said, “but there was some kind of problem with the name.”
According to the source, the government’s idea is that the facilities could be quickly converted back to conventional hospitality use to generate revenue for health care when the number of people requiring continuing care declines.
In addition, there are bound to be plenty of fast-food locations nearby that can dispense tastier food than any hospital cafeteria, and that also have experience distributing personal protective equipment when necessary.
“We’re pretty sure continuing care needs province-wide are going to go down considerably as soon as fewer people are getting vaccinated and more have access to naturopathic and reiki treatments through their new Alberta Health Spending Accounts,” the source said.
“Also, we’re confident that by having AIMCo invest your retirement savings entirely in oil and gas, Alberta will soon be richer than Norway, so elder Albertans will have a very generous pension compared to that chintzy Canada Pension Plan to help them pay for medical services if they unexpectedly happen to live past their natural life expectancy of 82 years,” they said.
The government really believes this will add up to a tremendous opportunity “to put hospitality back in the hospice,” the source added. “Talk about the Alberta Advantage!”
In other news, the province is expected to announce plans to create the Ralph Klein Centre of Excellence in Alternative Medicine. The Centre, to be located in Red Deer on the site of the former Red Deer Regional Hospital, will be built more efficiently through the use of the province’s first billion-dollar sole source contract, just as soon as the necessary legislation’s been passed. The centre’s homeopathic wing will be built first.
Alberta will also be the first Canadian province to fully fund Ivermectin for treatment of respiratory illnesses. …
Anyone still buying this? Or do I need to trowel it on some more? This is Alberta, of course, so you can never be sure.
Plus, what you think might be a good April Fool piece one day turns out to be government policy the next.
This has already happened to me once this spring: When the government introduced new health care regulations that eliminate any reference to minimum care hours for patients in continuing care. Ha-ha! Like that would ever happen … Oh! Wait!
Luckily, April 1 falls on a Monday this year, so it’ll probably take at least a couple of hours for them to come up with anything as crazy as this to announce.
*The Royal Adelaide Hospital, in Australia, in fact.
NOTE: And a happy birthday to you, today, Premier Smith!
I know this is April 1, which is also Danielle Smith’s birthday, but what the UCP are doing isn’t a joke. Danielle Smith and the UCP are wanting to fulfill what their hero Ralph Klein wanted, which is the intent of getting private for profit healthcare in Alberta, by underfunding the public healthcare system so much, that it is weakened to the point of collapse. Ralph Klein was a good deceiver, and many people fell for whatever he said. I didn’t, and I noticed everytime he lied, he had a stupid looking smirk on his face. When he spoke to the media, Ralph Klein was like this. Danielle Smith is the very same way. I know that she lies profusely, and when I see her do it, she also has the same off putting smirk on her face. Many people suffered from Ralph Klein’s brutal cutbacks to the public healthcare system in Alberta, including the many nurses who were laid off, and were forced into an early retirement, or had to leave the province, against their will, to the hospitals that were closed down, or got demolished, to the people who had their lives put in peril. I have heard of people suing the provincial government, when Ralph Klein was premier, because one of their loved ones died, as a result of his bad healthcare cuts. The settlements weren’t made public, but I heard that these people became like lotto winners afterwards, and were ending up very wealthy. The settlement payouts still can’t compensate for the senseless loss of life. You can also bet that when people lose their life over the UCP’s bad healthcare decisions, their families will sue the UCP. I wouldn’t doubt that the UCP will also lay off many nurses too. Where are they going to relocate to? I also remember reading about someone who had to assist nurses in relocating outside of Alberta, after Ralph Klein laid them off, and they were very emotional and upset with it. On top of all of this, we have Lyle Oberg being paid an unknown amount by Danielle Smith to help reconfigure AHS. He was the one responsible for firing Danielle Smith, when she was a public school trustee, in the late 1990s. Also, Lyle Oberg claimed to know about the skeletons in the closet, when he was an Alberta PC MLA, and was made to sit as an independent for a time, after he irked the Alberta PCs. What were those skeletons in the closet that he was talking about? In British Columbia, Lyle Oberg set up some private for profit healthcare facility, but it apparently failed. Had people listened to people who said that the UCP weren’t good, we wouldn’t be seeing these types of problems.
“…the government’s idea is that the facilities could be quickly converted back to conventional hospitality use to generate revenue for health care when the number of people requiring continuing care declines.”
Fake news. The real plan is to turn them into cell blocks, so that the Alberta Provincial Police will have somewhere to put environmentalists, dissident professors of education, and mouthy Juno winners.
Good one David!
They should rename it AHHS.
That’s exactly where they pull their ideas from.
Well look, the minute I saw this I knew it had to be a joke because you didn’t mention that the new Ralph Klein Centre of Excellence in Alternative Medicine would be built on swamp land. Other than that, everything is fine.
New slogan for the ad campaign: “You can check out any time you like but you can never leave”; “This could be heaven or this could be hell”; “We are all just pensioners here of our own device”.*
*Hotel California by The Eagles, mostly.
You know the world has gone to hell in a handbasket when articles in the Beaverton or the Onion – or like this one 😉 – are difficult to distinguish from genuine news …
Well, this is half April Fool’s joke and half reality. Actually, if it’s a matter of sustained funding for public health care, just combine AHS with the War Room?
Kill two birds with one stone, because one of them will get unlimited funding.
Why, oh Why would you want to put crazy ideas in the empty head of the UCP? (/s)
Brilliant, thank you for a good laugh, in short supply these days.
MAID service will help reduce clutter in regular wards while cleaning up after visits by therapy horses. Wealthier residents can choose to stay in the penthouse, formerly nicknamed SkyBox after the famous flying cowboy, Sky King, and his “friend” Nancy. Also under negotiation are ambulance services by the AMA and face masks by the wonderful Crochet Ladies of Lodge 99 in Pearl, AB.
Thanks for the morning chuckle… I hope just a chuckle. My only complaint, I’m pretty sure they photographed the wrong end of the Ivermectin patient.
Nice try, David! I was on to you after the first sentence!
Expat: Not to rain on your parade, but I do try to give it away high up in the story to save readers the embarrassment of penning angry letter to their MLA, MP, or whatever. My most successful April Fool ever is found here: https://rabble.ca/politics/canadian-politics/alison-redford-set-to-sue-alberta-government-wrongful-dismissal/ DJC
I think rainbows and lollipops is way too much optimistic for the UCP, although most of their ideas start and land in a shattered fantasy.
I am surprised Ralph Klein Centre of Excellence in Alternative Medicine has not been built yet, at least not in B.C. Some of you might recall the hot tub incident where a drunken Ralph broke some ribs after a fall in a hot tub and had to go to B.C. to get treated on account he upset the nurses in Alberta so bad that they may easily could have inflicted some torture on Ralph.
Going by the photograph provided, I guess that ivermectin treatment can leave the patient a little hoarse.
As I said to someone today when the topic of Ivermectin came up online: The neighs have it! DJC
Good one, David, you actually got me at the beginning and I started to pack my bags at last for B.C.! Truly worthy of the Beaverton. Or saying, quietly, the latest brainstorming on health policy by Smith and her gang.
Hah! Good one Dave. I tune into Albertapolitics.ca first thing every April 1st to see your latest. I had to double check that the story about gov’t mask distribution with your fast food wasn’t also published on April 1st. I don’t like to criticize someone when they look goofy in a random photo – it happens to the best of us – but the Minister of Mental Health and Addiction photo is pretty funny.
As an aside I lament that April Fool’s stories, even the most obvious larks, now have to have a disclaimer or last paragraph explaining that it’s a joke. People believe anything they read/hear and then get indignant if they fall for it – senseless snowflakes…
Could we hope for UBER Ambulances?
POGO: We’ve got them now. But you’ve got to download the app. DJC
I am a pragmatic NDP voter.
I am legally a Canadian citizen. I can beat cancer without going bankrupt.
I am legally a United States citizen. I can shoot and own a handgun.
If someone says “I am” and only refers to one idea or one right, you will hear me scream.
Skinny vegetarians are not supposed to get cancer.
Law enforcement officers are not supposed to be killed on duty.
Some people need to take a good in a mirror.
Regarding Rainbow Motels.
Not sure if this UCP government is inept, corrupt, white christian nationalist or just plain in over their heads.
Quick dive into entities called (something like) Rainbow Motels. Thon Hotels (previously known as Rainbow Hotels) is owned by Olav Thon of Norway.
Rainbow Hotels, Olav Thon’s company, banned Rainbow flags for gay pride events.
Don’t know what this “Rainbow” means to Albertans. But it means a lot of money to the UCP elected officials, which of course will passed onto Alberta residents.
Do we want more ineptness, more corruption, more pseudo christian sanctimonious bull crap?
The Pierre Pollipoivre ads are so cringe worthy. It’s embarrassing to watch his over serious, under whelming pinch lipped scare-mongering.
Envious, much.
For what it’s worth, ain’t no fan of that Adriana LaGrange. She reminds me of every jealous, resentful religious person I grew up with.
For the Adriana and Pierre P. kinda people, they believe if their religion forbids music, dancing, going out, we should all be punished.
I totally understand this thinking.
April Fool’s Day joke or truth stranger than fiction?
At least one truth has passed through the post-modern truthiness barrier and come out the other side unscathed:
bookies can still make odds, either way.
Best Aprils Fool’s con was from a local Edmonton radio station that broadcast in their morning show that everyone listening should take their phone off the cradle so that AGT could “blow the lines clear”! Worked for too many people, so they had to retract so people would hang up their phones!!! [Younger readers may not understand phone on a cradle, nor AGT.]
Great April Fools story.
More brilliance from the UCP. I knew when Lagrange was put in charge that the innovative thinking the UCP is known for would transform our health care system. Soon we will be the envy of the world when it comes to publicly funded well-managed health care. No wonder Marlaina is so universally admired for her compassionate yet efficient management of health care.
One more thing.
Chelsae Pertrovik. MLA where the place the mining scam in the southern foothills going on.
Remember the May long weekend reversal of strip mining by the always ambitious, college dropout Jason Kenney?
So much incompetence?
Maliciousness? Ineptness?
Well Ms. Petrovik is now designated Alberta Parlamentarien.
She was the opponent of Kevin Tigham.
Ms. Parliamenarian Petrovik was also well known for telling her constituents that they don’t deserve health care if they’re fat or have some kind of heart issue.
Ms. Petrovik is neither a physician or a registered nurse.
Please do your research on what this serious position requires.
April 1, we get the gas tax reinstated at 4 cents per litre, which will most likely go towards for profit privatized health care and for profit privatized education. Alberta Premier Marlaina Podunk(sic) has no problem with the hard working tax paying Albertans paying for this cash grab. Meanwhile, the price on carbon also went up, 3 cents per litre, which 80 percent of Albertans will get back, plus extra, and Smith is in a spittle flecked rage over this one. Smith is a joke, not just April fools, that we have to endure for another 3, possibly 4 years.
One more thing.
Kelechi Madu (Kaycee or KC) was a UCP MLA in Edmonton.
He was defeated.
Mr. Madu has sent his children to the Notre Dame School in, wait for it.
Wilcox, Saskatchewan.
Sucking up. This guy likes Power, political Power.
Where is Wilcox, Saskatchewan?
Who the hell cares.
With a population of about 100, it’s smaller than a popular restaurant in Edmonton or Calgary or Lethbridge or Medicine Hat or Red Deer or Airdrie or many other places.
Jason Kenney’s dad was Headmaster at this all boys school.
It is a Catholic School and gets all kinds of government tax benefits.
This Wilcox, SK. Notre Dame School receives millions of tax dollars.
I am Catholic as well as many other things. One thing, though.
Lying is a sin.
White Rural Rage.
It’s the name of a book published by Tom Schaller and Paul Waldman a few weeks ago.
If readers have access to Youtube, type in this search: Trae Crowder Tom Schaller Paul Waldman.
Schaller and Waldman are the authors of White Rural Rage.
Trae Crowder’s interview of the authors is open minded, and so opens up the myth of the “old south”.
If you hear someone say “bless your heart” and think it is a condolence or appeasement or agreement, honey we got to talk.
This united states southern backward political garbage is tryin’ to make a home in Canada.
Trae Crowder is a funny intelligent guy have access
Alberta Health and Hospitality Services – sadly this doesn’t sound far enough from reality to be an April Fools headline. It’s not a good sign when such headlines seem credible and believable.
The Ralph Klein Klein Centre for Excellence in Alternative Medicine sounds a bit more like an April Fools story, but with this UCP bunch who knows. They might actually think that is a good idea too. The only thing worse than their not thinking about things is when they do. Hopefully this April Fools story will not turn out to be an accurate prediction of things in a year or two.
Hey J. Are you bad AI or just incoherent? I know, I know, don’t slag fellow commentators, but does that include AI?
Well, you got a fast response. New mental health and addiction agency being formed in restructuring of AHS
I wonder if the details of the bill covers motels!
JK: When in doubt, predict the creation of a centre of excellence. In unexcellent Alberta, you just can’t go wrong! DJC
As far as Poliviere is concerned
M D G A – “Make Duplessis Great Agi’n”
Smith reverses her ban on name choices in schools. Kids can now be called whatever they like. Anything to stop people from calling her by her dead name, Marlaina Kolodnicki.
Thanks for the laughs. Read this on 8 April, so it didn’t click until I got to the part about the motels being turned back into motels for tourists. Its kind of, omg, Alberta’s government is so weird an april fools joke might be taken as news. o.k. maybe I’m just not getting it as fast as I used to.
Some one could put this on a calender to check how close Smith is to what you have written.