Province still lacking when it comes to nursing home facilities: Critics

Linda Hartson is tired.
For the past five years, she’s been caring for her 71-year-old husband, Basil Hartson, who was diagnosed with dementia in 2003.
She’d like to get him into a nursing home and says he’s on lists around the city but it’s hard to secure a spot and the cost is more than she can afford.
“He can’t do anything for himself anymore,” she said.
The Red Cross provides eight hours of respite care each week, but the rest of the time she’s his only support.
New Democrat Leader Darrell Dexter spoke out against the government yesterday saying their promise of 150 additional nursing home beds in Cobequid Region has yet to materialize.
The government promised to have the home opened by 2005, he said.
Pamela Hafey with the Health Department said the plan for a new home in Hammonds Plains is going ahead and the 156-bed facility will be ready by January 2010.
But Dexter said he’s heard it all before.
“It has been announced and confirmed by the Department of Health and the minister of health now more than a dozen times,” he said.