Red Deer Hospital Appears Empty Despite Capacity “at more than 100 percent”

In one of the most startling disconnects between the Alberta government and AHS fearmongering and reality, despite Red Deer Regional Hospital being said to be over 100 percent of normal capacity, there seems to be little evidence inside the hospital of a massive surge in patients.

During a September 2021 press conference, both Premier Jason Kenney, as well as AHS CEO Dr. Verna Yiu, pushed misinformation by stating or implying that Red Deer Regional Hospital was being overwhelmed by an influx of COVID-19 patients.

Dr. Yiu at the press conference said:

I think one of the benefits of Alberta Health Services is that we are a provincial entity, and over the past several weeks we have been doing what we call ‘load-leveling,’ which is basically helping to support the areas where in fact the capacity may be at 100 percent. So, for example, and in the Central Zone where we know that the Red Deer Regional Hospital is consistently at more than 100 percent of its usual capacity.

This is simply misinformation or disinformation that Dr. Yiu is putting out. Over the past three months, the AHS’ own data shows that the Red Deer Regional Hospital is at 98 percent of “beds or spaces in operation” yet videos from someone walking around that hospital in September, October and November reveal a facility that seems nearly empty.

Below is a video put together by David Dickson, a former Liverpool police officer and now operator of an Alberta cybersecurity firm, who has been working diligently over the past year to assess the accuracy of information coming out of AHS. 

One would assume that if the Red Deer Regional Hospital was running at over 100 percent capacity like Dr. Yiu asserted, or 98 percent like the AHS data claims, then there would be a little bit more activity in the hospital’s hallways. Empty beds certainly would not be lining the walls and you’d expect to see more than just a couple of nurses.

Albertans deserve an explanation on why the Premier’s and the AHS CEO’s statements on the Red Deer Regional Hospital are so out-of-sync with reality. It is especially concerning that Dr. Yiu is putting out such blatantly inaccurate information as she is supposed to be the expert when it comes to AHS operations and performance, but instead, she is acting more like a COVID-19 propagandist.

Why is it that Cypress-Medicine Hat MLA Drew Barnes has been the only provincial politician asking questions regarding misinformation being out of by AHS officials. It should be obvious to anyone after watching the Red Deer Hospital footage that the narrative put out by the Alberta government and AHS is either deeply misinformed or a total fabrication. 

The sad truth is that nonsense claims that specific hospitals are being overwhelmed by COVID-19 patients are giving the government cover in the eyes of many people to put in place vaccine mandates that violate Charter Rights, and have been proven to not even effectively curb COVID-19 infections.