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This article was published 9/2/2017 (1315 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A day after scrapping a $300-million CancerCare Manitoba building project, the province's health minister says he's open to alternative ways of meeting the ever-growing needs of cancer patients.

Kelvin Goertzen said he's asked the CancerCare management and board to "re-imagine" the project and find "creative" ways to move it forward.

He said the cost of the original plan, which called for the construction of a new CancerCare building and the refurbishment of the current one on McDermot Avenue, "wasn't feasible" given the province's dire financial situation.

In an interview Thursday, Goertzen wouldn't speculate on what would be a more satisfactory price tag for government.

"I join with them in hoping that we can find a financial model that works," he said.

"We have to make decisions so that in 10 years from now we don’t just have a building, but we have the ability to actually provide the service that has to happen in that building."

The Progressive Conservatives announced Wednesday that more than $1 billion in health-care projects approved by the former NDP government were to be scrapped or sent back to the drawing board.

Goertzen said the government has not abandoned all capital health projects, but it's focusing on those where the need is most critical. For example, the province recently approved a $23-million contract to redevelop and expand the emergency department at the Dauphin Regional Health Centre because failing to do so could have placed it at risk of losing its accreditation, he said.

A new CancerCare Manitoba facility has been in the planning stages since the spring of 2011. At that time, the agency said it was so short of space that it was converting washrooms into offices and cannibalizing meeting rooms to conduct pediatric clinical trials. It hoped a new, expanded facility would allow it to retain and attract the brightest specialists and researchers.

Dr. Sri Navaratnam, CancerCare's president and CEO, said Thursday she was saddened and disappointed by the government's announcement.

"The need (for cancer treatment) is not going away," she said. In fact, with an aging population, it will only increase, she added.

Navaratnam, who met with Goertzen Wednesday as word came out that the project was cancelled, said she is taking some comfort knowing he appears to understand the challenges her organization is facing.

Construction of the new CancerCare building was to have begun in the summer of 2018.

A lot of private money had already been raised for the project, which was to be located on the site of the Manitoba Clinic at Sherbrook Street at McDermot Avenue.

The CancerCare Manitoba Foundation had acquired the land and was to pay for the cost of the demolition of the clinic, at a total cost of $19.5 million. The foundation also set a target of fundraising at least 20 per cent of the total project costs.

Navaratnam said the organization will get to work to come up with a new more-cost efficient proposal that it hopes will satisfy government.

"Whatever we look at as an option, it cannot compromise patient care and safety. It cannot compromise operational efficiency or cost… and it cannot reduce the patient satisfaction and patient experience," she said.

larry.kusch@freepress.mb.ca