'Maybe we shouldn't have moved here': Military family struggles to find doctor in Greater Victoria
A young military couple that's new to Vancouver Island is scrambling to find a family doctor, and they're questioning their move to the capital region entirely.
The couple and their two young sons recently packed up and headed to Sooke, B.C., from Winnipeg after father Yaz Malhas was transferred to CFB Esquimalt.
He says the stress of the move is compounded by B.C.'s health-care crisis.
"That's a whole different level, and I think it's beyond stressful at this point," he said.
Malhas says he has a doctor provided to him through the military, but his wife and their two sons need to find one.
"It's really concerning, as a parent of young children," said Steph Malhas.
The family says that in Winnipeg, and in other Canadian cities they've lived in, it took no time to find a family doctor.
"We never had this problem elsewhere – and we've been all over the country," said Yaz.
"So I was shocked when we moved here and found out that this was the situation," he said.
'PRESSING PROBLEM'
The family's struggle is one that's shared by hundreds of thousands of British Columbians who are currently without a family doctor.
It's a problem that was recently highlighted by an aging Central Saanich, B.C., couple who resorted to taking out an ad in a newspaper to plead for a family doctor to help fill prescriptions.
On Wednesday, B.C. Premier John Horgan acknowledged that the province's health-care system was under strain.
"It's a real and pressing problem, and we're doing everything we can to address it," he said.
"But it needs to be across the country, not just across the community."
Horgan says he and fellow premiers pressed the prime minister for healthcare funding during a summit in Victoria last month.
He says he's hopeful that urgently needed funding will arrive before the summer is over.
Yaz says even though he wanted to come to B.C., where they have family members, the ordeal has given him second thoughts.
"Maybe we shouldn't have moved here," he told CTV News. "Had I known that we might not be able to find a family doctor."
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
BREAKING Federal employees will be required to spend 3 days a week in the office
Starting in September, public servants in the core public administration will be required to work in the office a minimum of three days a week. The Treasury Board Secretariat says executives will need to be in the office four days per week.
Concerns about plexiglass prompt inspections at some Loblaws locations in Ottawa
Inspections are underway at more than one Loblaws location in Ottawa after complaints were filed about tall plexiglass barriers.
OPP officer said 'someone's going to get hurt' before wrong-way Hwy. 401 crash
As multiple Durham police cruisers were chasing a robbery suspect on the wrong side of Highway 401 Monday night, an Ontario Provincial Police officer shared his concerns, telling a dispatcher, "Someone's going to get hurt."
Canada's most wanted fugitive arrested in P.E.I. in connection with Toronto homicide
A suspect in a fatal shooting in Toronto’s east end last summer has been arrested in Charlottetown, just one week after he topped a list of Canada’s most wanted fugitives.
Poilievre returns to House unrepentant for calling Trudeau 'wacko,' Speaker not resigning
An unrepentant Pierre Poilievre returned to the House of Commons on Wednesday to pepper the prime minister about his drug decriminalization policies after being booted the day prior for refusing to take back calling Justin Trudeau 'wacko' over his approach to the issue.
Five human skeletons, missing hands and feet, found outside house of Nazi leader Hermann Göring
Archeologists have unearthed the skeletons of five people, missing their hands and feet, at a former Nazi military base in Poland.
Toddler of Phoenix first responder dies after bounce house goes airborne
A two-year-old child died after a strong gust of wind sent the bounce house he was in airborne and into a neighbouring lot in central Arizona, the Pinal County Sheriff's Office said.
Plane overshoots runway at airport in St. John's, N.L., no injuries reported
Investigators from the Transportation Safety Board of Canada are headed to St. John's, N.L., after a plane overshot a runway at the city's airport this afternoon.
A teen was found buried in a basement in New York. An engraved ring helped police learn her identity two decades later
Investigators have finally revealed the identity of an unknown victim nicknamed 'Midtown Jane Doe,' who was found in the Hell's Kitchen neighbourhood of New York City two decades ago.