It is difficult for many Canadians to imagine the situation in some other countries where tolerance is not necessarily the norm. The recent case of British school teacher Gillian Gibbons being jailed in Sudan and receiving death threats after allowing her young students to name a class teddy bear “Mohammed” is one such example. Who would have thought that a simple gesture of children naming a teddy bear in Sudan would result in angry demonstrations? Yet this is the case far away from Canada.

In Canada, we seem to have other catalysts that arouse emotion. The new Brampton Civic Hospital has been described by The Toronto Star as a lightning rod for opposition to so-called P3 projects after controversy occurred surrounding the death of a 52 year old patient. The Toronto Star reported December 5 that at least one community group was blaming the death on understaffing and that “both sides in the fracas – the province, the developer and hospital on one side, and the unions, NDP and the Ontario Health Coalition on the other – accuse the other of misleading the public”.

The death of any patient is an unfortunate event and preventative consideration always worthwhile even in hindsight.  There may be shortcomings that need attention but the problems faced by the neophyte hospital are likely multi-faceted and not simply a result of private/public partnering. In my opinion, the likelihood that polarizing the problems at the Brampton Civic into a private vs public frenzy will result in a beneficial outcome for anybody involved is almost zero.

The waits and unfilled positions at the Brampton facility as well as the rise in emergency demand are problems facing many other hospitals. These problems are not specific to P3 institutions.

While a protest rally is expected at the hospital on December 9, we should be asking ourselves if this is really a response that will move health care forward for the sake of patients or is it to serve some other purpose. Tolerance has always been an ingredient for understanding and problem solving. Let us hope that calm heads prevail now and in the future.