Toronto

Trent Hills Mayor Hector Macmillan came to Queen’s Park Thursday to take on the bureaucracy that he says is keeping him, and around 1,000 others, from having a life-saving cancer treatment.

The mayor said that Ontarians are dying from the type of pancreatic cancer he has because of bureaucracy. He has been denied coverage for out-of-country treatment in the United States that would save his life because Ontario’s health system considers it experimental.

“The system is rigged so that you will fail and the appeal process is even more difficult,” he said. “Every step that you make there is a roadblock that you’re not allowed to do something.”

Macmillan has been forced to begin fundraising to pay for the $300,000 treatment.

He says he needs a procedure known as Nanoknife surgery to treat his pancreatic cancer, which was diagnosed at Stage 4. Subsequent treatments have helped and moved him back to Stage 2 or 3, he said.

The surgery is still considered experimental by Ontario’s Ministry of Health and is not funded. Macmillan took his fight public in late August, challenging Health Minister Eric Hoskins to help.

“This government does fund out-of-country experimental procedures, therapies and drugs,” Macmillan said. “I believe they pick and choose which ones they’re going to fund as to how sexy they look in the media.”

Progressive Conservative MPP Lisa MacLeod said Macmillan’s fight is not unique, many Ontarians are forced to fundraise for out-of-country treatment and that needs to change.

“It’s become abundantly clear that the appropriate processes in place are not working for thousands of Ontario patients like Mayor Macmillan,” she said. “The minister of health cannot continue to wash his hands of Ontario patients who are falling through the cracks.”

Macleod also said Macmillan’s situation highlights a reality many politicians don’t want to recognize: Ontario already has two-tiered health care.

“When a cancer patient has to raise money for their drugs or for their therapies, we have two-tiered health care,” she said. “I don’t think we should hide from that anymore.”

Hoskins spoke with Macmillan briefly in the legislature Thursday morning but would not say what they discussed. He did said he was sorry about Macmillan’s diagnosis and the difficulty he’s had within the system.

But Hoskins said it’s doctors who make the call on out-of-country treatments, not politicians.

“We rely on clinicians, clinical experts, specialists,” he said. “I don’t get involved. I can’t get involved ... The Health Insurance Act explicitly indicates that the minister cannot approve nor deny or get involved in that process, nor should I.”

sjeffords@postmedia.com