Sask. minister says province doesn't have addictions wait-time data. It does
CBC
It can take as long as six weeks to receive in-patient addiction treatment in Saskatchewan, according to data obtained from the province’s Ministry of Health.
The data obtained by CBC News through a freedom of information request appears to contradict the claims of Lori Carr, the government’s minister of mental health and addictions.
In public comments and in the provincial legislature, Carr has repeatedly said the government does not have wait-time data.
“The [facilities] track them individually. So it's really hard to kind of reconcile all of that is happening at this point in time,” Carr said on Monday.
The documents obtained by CBC News provide data on the average wait time for nearly every adult in-patient facility in the province as far back as the 2022-23 fiscal year.
The NDP’s critic for mental health and addictions said the conflicting information offered by Carr and the documents obtained by CBC verifies her concerns about the minister.
“[Carr] doesn't have a clue,” said Betty Nippi-Albright in an interview this week.
CBC News sent a detailed list of questions to the government of Saskatchewan, asking for clarity on the conflicting information.
The government did not address CBC's request for clarity in its response.
Nippi-Albright has spent much of the current legislative session attempting to get information from the government on the number of people waiting to obtain treatment.
The former addictions counsellor said she had been unsuccessful in getting those answers until CBC News provided her with a copy of the documents obtained through the freedom of information request.
“Withholding information that the public needs to know, that's wrong,” Nippi-Albright said.
The data released by the Ministry of Health shows that wait times to access addictions treatment can vary across the province.
As of the 2024-25 fiscal year, some locations, such as the four beds at the St. Joseph’s Health Centre in Île-à-la-Crosse, have a median wait time for in-patient treatment of zero days.
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