LHSC receiving close to $15M from province to offset pandemic costs

London Health Sciences Centre in London, Ont.

Queen's Park will be providing almost $15 million to London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) to reimburse the hospital for the costs of caring for COVID-19 patients over the course of the pandemic.

On Friday, the province announced the hospital will receive $14,902,189. LHSC saw a significant increase to its ICU capacity because of the virus and had to purchase ventilators and other equipment.

“These last two years have been a time of challenge and sacrifice, for healthcare workers, and for our community. COVID-19 has put additional strain on our daily operations, including redeploying our staff to high need areas, adopting virtual care, and expanding our business to help with vaccination and assessment,” said Dr. Jackie Schleifer Taylor, LHSC president and CEO.

“These measures required investments to allow our health-care teams to meet the needs of our community. We're appreciative of the government’s recognition of this fact, as represented by this investment. We look forward to working closely together with the government to ensure we continue to provide exceptional patient-centric care,” she added in a statement.

Meanwhile, St. Joseph’s Health Care will get $2,463,329 and Strathroy-Middlesex General will see $471,343.