Hamilton, Burlington and Niagara are losing the bus that brings cancer screening and stop-smoking support to residents who otherwise have difficulty accessing health services.

The province cut the $634,689 needed annually to run the Mobile Cancer Screening Coach that travels throughout the Hamilton Niagara Haldimand Brant Local Health Integration Network.

"I can't believe how callous that move would be," said David Murphy, president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 7800 at Hamilton Health Sciences (HHS).

"This is such a preventive measure to save people's lives and it's the vulnerable."

The coach will run until the end of March after the HHS Foundation agreed to pay for it short-term. It goes off the road in April.

"Why was that decision made?" asked Hamilton epidemiologist Neil Johnston, who specializes in social determinants of health.

"Is it because they have evidence it doesn't do any good or is it another decision that is frankly whimsical ... without any evidence behind it."

The main reason given by the Ministry of Health Thursday is that it costs three times more to perform mammograms on the coach than it does on other screening buses.

Visitors to the bus can also get pap tests and colon screening kits.

"The Hamilton Niagara Haldimand Brant region is well-resourced," spokesperson David Jensen said in a statement referencing family doctors and the 22 active Ontario Breast Screening Program sites.

But Johnston says the point was to bring the care to those who have trouble accessing it.

"The bus program was started as an attempt to get the rates of screening, which obviously are proven to be of value, up in areas of the city that were perceived to have a high risk of women not participating," he said.

"If truly taking a service to the people actually does increase their participation rate, than cancelling it is not a good thing."

Launched in 2013 by Cancer Care Ontario, the coach has travelled to newcomers, the LGBTQ community, Indigenous peoples, low-income neighbourhoods and workplaces.

"The awareness is going to be hit and that's not good," said Christina Barahona, lifelong care support worker at the Hamilton Regional Indian Centre.

It's significant because The Spectator's Code Red project has exposed shocking disparities at the neighbourhood level including those in the poorest areas dying of cancer at significantly higher rates partly because of differences in screening.

"There's a perception in many neighbourhoods in Hamilton that nobody really cares about them and the resources are preferentially given to wealthier areas," said Johnston, who is part of the Code Red team.

"If people see health facilities in the neighbourhood, I think it makes a point to them that 'Yes people do care' and I think that's very very important."

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

jfrketich@thespec.com

905-526-3349 | @Jfrketich

- Hamilton's forensic pathology unit closing as death investigations move to Toronto

Read more about: