As temperatures soar across the province, the strain is growing on air conditioning systems at a number of Manitoba health-care facilities. Debbie Dault came to Ste. Anne Hospital to get lab work done with her daughter on Wednesday, only to find it was closed. “It’s an older hospital, I don’t know how well it’s maintained so it’s not very good when the air conditioner goes,” Dault said. On Monday, the Southern Health-Santé Sud region said Ste. Anne Hospital was closed after the air conditioning went down. A spokesperson said Wednesday the hospital may reopen next week, once an inspection and testing are complete. “We are currently exhausting every resource we possibly can to be able to remedy the situation,” said Dana Human, interim CEO with the health authority. Existing patients were transferred to hospitals in Steinbach and the Morden and Winkler area. In the meantime, the closure is a challenge for Dault. She doesn’t drive, and her daughter has to come in from Winnipeg to take her to appointments in Ste. Anne. “If you don’t drive it’s hard to get to somewhere else,” Dault said. “You either have to go to Winnipeg, or you have to go to Steinbach or you even have to go further. People around here like this hospital because it’s convenient.” The hospital isn’t the only facility struggling with the heat. Three Winnipeg-area personal care homes are all dealing with air conditioning issues: Donwood Manor, Pembina Place and Middlechurch, in West St. Paul. Lydia Danilis’s grandfather is a Middlechurch resident, and she found him in a troubling state earlier this week. “I found him very limp, shirtless, very fatigued, not having any kind of additional fan or ventilation in his room,” Danilis said. Health experts say the longer facilities go without air conditioning, the greater the risk of heat illness, especially for vulnerable people like seniors. “It’s more difficult for a person with cognitive challenges to perceive that they are not feeling well and then to act on it,” said Alecs Chochinov, professor of emergency medicine at the University of Manitoba. CTV News reached out to the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority for an update Wednesday. They acknowledged the request but had not responded as of publication. Manitoba’s Minister of Health, Seniors and Long-Term Care, Uzoma Asagwara, was also asked for comment Wednesday. Asagwara said in a statement that every available tool must be used by these facilities to keep residents cool while cooling system failures are addressed as quickly as possible. Asagwara said in part, “we are working directly alongside personal care homes and regional health authorities to respond to immediate needs and improve conditions.” Multiple large, industrial portable air-conditioning units are now operating at Middlechurch on the affected units and have brought temperatures down. The replacement part needed to repair the system is currently in transit and is expected to arrive Wednesday. WRHA facilities leadership remains on site monitoring temperatures and supporting the response. At Pembina Place, contractors have restored the rooftop HVAC unit after working on it for several days. As a precaution in case of another breakdown, the home has also secured three industrial portable air-conditioning units as a precaution. Meanwhile, significant flooding and sewage contamination during the June rainfall event damaged air-handling equipment in Donwood Manor’s basement. A large temporary air-conditioning unit is expected to arrive Thursday or Friday and will be connected directly to the area experiencing higher temperatures.
