AHS & How To Lie With Statistics.

Alberta Health Service CEO Dr. Verna Yiu, during a COVID-19 press conference on September 23, made multiple claims about hospital capacity that could be classified as misinformation based on AHS data showing the narrative that hospitals could be overwhelmed is heavily exaggerated and potentially outright false.

David Dickson, a former Liverpool police officer who now runs a cybersecurity firm in Alberta, created a video matching Dr. Yiu’s statements in the press conference against AHS’ up-to-date data which deviates from the figures she reports as being true.

The most egregious of Dr. Yiu’s claim is that currently, 310 Albertans are in ICU and that Alberta has never had that many patients in ICU in its entire history, despite AHS’ own data showing that the province consistently has had more patients in ICU on average year-to-year even before COVID was a public health threat

Rather shockingly despite Dr. Yiu saying that Alberta currently has 310 patients in ICU the actual number of ICU beds listed during late August by AHS day-to-day is only 190 while 1,491 beds have been funded since April 2020.

This means that despite having the budget allocated for up to 1,491 beds they are only actually utilizing 190 beds then suddenly when Alberta had an influx of ICU patients the number of ICU beds available suddenly jumped to being more than 310 beds to take in all the new patients.

Regular Acute Care beds are also funded so that AHS can be operating

Alberta is supposedly at risk of having its hospitals overwhelmed yet no matter how many more people are admitted to the hospitals and even ICU the capacity continues to expand yet always keeping the AHS within a crisis situation. Beds coming available while Albertans are being told we are nearly out of beds constantly is incredibly dishonest, especially when Premier Jason Kenney is passing new restrictions based on AHS claiming they are in a crisis.