RNAO says that Premier Doug Ford should have addressed the challenges in the health system, including nursing shortages, in January 2022 by instituting added public health measures. Instead, the premier’s measures – which included halting indoor dining at restaurants as well as reducing capacity limits for restaurants and shopping malls to 50 per cent – did not address the ongoing nursing crisis. RNAO says patients will pay the price. “It is a blow to the thousands of Ontarians who are awaiting diagnostic tests, procedures and surgeries, and who will need to wait even longer with inevitable increases in morbidity and mortality,” said RNAO President Morgan Hoffarth. If the premier and chief medical officer of health had listened and acted earlier, the impact of Omicron on hospitals and other health-care settings could have been avoided, Hoffarth added. (Durham Radio News, Jan. 4)