Date of publication: 04 Apr 2022 • 9 minutes ago • 3 minutes reading • 19 comments The CEO of Alberta Health Services Dr. Verna Yiu provides an update on the province’s response to COVID-19 and the new Omicron variant during a press conference in Edmonton on November 29, 2021. Photo by David Bloom / Postmedia, archive
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Dr. Verna Yu has resigned as president and CEO of Alberta Health Services more than a year before her contract expires.
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Neither Alberta Health nor AHS have confirmed to Postmedia whether Yiu was fired or resigned, but AHS has confirmed that Yiu will receive a one-year severance pay of more than $ 573,000, which is guaranteed in her contract if she is fired “without just cause”. Yiu’s contract was extended last June for another two years. In a press release Monday from AHS, Yiu thanked staff, doctors and volunteers and expressed pride in their work. “I took on this role in 2016 because I saw the opportunity to further consolidate the culture, teamwork and excellence within the organization. “I believed we could develop better relationships with our patients and families and with the communities of Alberta,” Yiu wrote. The AHS said in a statement that a commission of inquiry had been set up “several months ago” to begin looking for Yiu’s replacement, but did not give a specific reason for Yiu’s departure.
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In a separate statement, Health Minister Jason Copping thanked Yiu for her leadership over the past six years, saying the change in leadership at AHS would accelerate the government’s plan to renew its healthcare system, which includes more surgeries with public funding. private facilities in an effort to cut waiting lists. “It’s time to move forward with an ambitious agenda to improve and modernize the health care system, and renewed leadership at Alberta Health Services will support these changes,” Copping said, adding that the pandemic changed the government’s plan. , but not its goals to improve access. “The agreement with Dr. “Yiu announced today that the board will increase the timetable for the transition and help the system move forward,” Copping said.
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Mauro Chies, vice president of Cancer Care Alberta and Clinical Support Services, was called to serve as interim CEO of the provincial health authority. Reacting to the announcement, opposition NDP health critic David Shepherd claimed that Yiu had been fired by the AHS board in retaliation for her public honesty and that her departure would create chaos and uncertainty in the public healthcare system. “I can only wonder if the habit of Dr. Yiu to give the Albertans the direct products is part, if not the main reason, the UCP fired her. “It has become the target of extremist factions within the UCP – MLAs that oppose even the most basic public health measures,” Shepherd said. He added that the move appears to be an attempt to appease the “extremists” of the United Conservative Party in view of the vote to review the leadership of Prime Minister Jason Kenny.
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Yiu, a graduate of the University of Alberta and Harvard University, was first hired as interim president and CEO in January 2016, following a five-year term that began in June 2016. She was often involved with Chief Health Officer Dr. Dina Hinsaw for updates on COVID-19 throughout the pandemic and was at times honest about the state of the provincial health care system. In September, when ICU beds doubled to meet growing demand and surgeries were canceled, Yiu said it was “tragic” that the system was able to keep up only in part because ICU patients were dying. Yiu’s leadership in the AHS has also been targeted by some UCP MLAs. In early December, Peace River MLA leader Dan Williams accused the AHS leadership of threatening to “abandon” the Albertans by demanding a vaccine for its staff for COVID-19, which has since been discontinued.
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“The AHS leadership is holding a knife to my throat, every day for 91 days, in many of my remote communities, implementing no Plan B,” Williams said. The vaccination mandate for health workers was controversial and was scrapped in March by government order. When Lac Ste. Anne-Parkland UCP MLA Shane Getson said publicly last fall that Alberts should “make more money” than those running AHS, a comment he later apologized for sparked a spate of support for Yiu, including health workers and doctors who visited social media with the hashtag #ThankYiu. Last week, former Wildrose leader Danielle Smith, who is running for UCP in Livingstone-Macleod and is monitoring the party leadership, said the AHS should be restructured and Yiu’s contract should not be extended. Defense team Friends of Medicare said in a statement Monday that Yiu’s removal paves the way for the government to accelerate a privatization agenda. “Using the AHS or its leadership as a scapegoat for the government’s political failures has long served as a convenient means of diversion, and it is safe to say that we are seeing it again now,” said Chief Executive Chris Gallaway. More to follow… [email protected] twitter.com/reportrix
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