The President and C.E.O of Alberta Health Services says he is sorry for the way he conducted himself in front of media Friday afternoon after he emerged from a day-long meeting focused on developing new protocols to reduce emergency department wait times.
Stephen Duckett refused to answer any questions about over-capacity issues and instead would only talk about the cookie he was eating, at one point shoving the snack in a reporter's face.
In a blog posted later that day, the official says it's unfortunate that the way he handled himself eclipsed the strides made by the 93 health care professionals working to ease the crunch at Alberta hospitals.
The statement reads in part,
"The meeting made great progress. That success has to some extent been overshadowed by my poor responses to the media afterwards, which I deeply regret and for which I apologize unreservedly.
"Most regrettably, I did not convey what I deeply feel, which is the greatest respect for the difficult challenges our health care providers face every day, and their innumerable achievements, and what those challenges and achievements mean for our patients and their families."
By Saturday afternoon, the exchange with reporters garnered more than 4,300 YouTube hits and a firestorm of tweets.
Gene Zwozdesky, the Minister of Health, describes the conduct of the province's top health official as "inappropriate" but says he does not intend to remove Duckett from his post.
"He is in the role he is in right now and I have to have a level of comfort and confidence in him that he is going to deliver," said Zwozdesky, alluding to a number of accountability measures that are expected to be in place by the end of the year.
"We are going to give everyone in the system a chance to do that."
The Liberals, however, are calling for Duckett to resign, saying the "dismissive and disrespectful" behaviour is not appropriate for a person in charge of a $15-billion industry.
"I think he needs to leave. I think we need to find a new man for the job," said party leader David Swann.
"I think he's lost the respect of the professionals in the system, lost the respect for many Albertans. This is not the way a CEO of the largest health operation in the country acts.
Friday's event came on the heels of a number of contentious developments in the health care field.
At the beginning of October a leaked document from the Alberta Medical Association warned of "potential catastrophic collapse of timely emergency care delivery" because of chronic overcrowding in hospitals across the province.
Two weeks later, the province revealed it could take until March 2015 to reach its target for emergency room wait times, where 90 per cent of patients are treated and discharged within a four-hour window.
Then this week Dr. Raj Sherman threatened to quit his position as parliamentary assistant for health because of "broken promises" he says his government made to emergency room doctors. He also lambasted former Health Minister Ron Liepert, saying the politician was rude to frontline workers when he held the portfolio.
The NDP argues Duckett's behaviour comes from the same vein and speaks to larger issues within the Stelmach administration.
"Given we're in the middle of a health care crisis, to me, it sounded like Mr. Duckett telling Albertans, 'let them eat cake'," said party leader Brian Mason.
"The real issue here is the ongoing disregard shown by the Tory government and health system leadership toward patients and frontline staff."
Duckett works under a contract worth almost $600,000 in base salary, and earned an additional $76,000 in bonuses last year.
For a look at Duckett's statement in full, click here.
With Files from Kevin Armstrong
