Kawartha Lakes police are asking for the public’s help in locating an 87-year-old man in Lindsay.

Emerson Fiander, who has dementia, left a Lindsay long-term care facility on Tuesday morning (May 30).

While Fiander routinely takes extended walks, he usually returns on his own. Nursing staff at his residence, as well as his family, are concerned for Fiander’s safety.

Fiander is described as a white man, 5’4″ (165cm) and 174 lbs (79kg), with gray hair, blue eyes, and glasses. When last seen, he was wearing a white T-shirt, black shorts. and hiking shoes.

Police are conducting a search in an area at the north end of Lindsay and are being assisted by Ontario Provincial Police.

Anyone with information about Fiander’s whereabouts is asked to call the Kawartha Lakes Police Service at 705-324-5252.

Business owners from Minden spoke to the media on Tuesday (May 30) at Queen’s Park in Toronto alongside NDP MPP Chris Glover (Spadina-Fort York) and NDP health critic France Gélinas (Nickel Belt) to once again call on the Ford government to step in and stop the closure of Minden’s emergency department set for Thursday (June 1).

During question period on Monday, NDP Leader Marit Stiles introduced petitions containing over 24,000 signatures opposing the closure of the emergency department. Stiles asked health minister Sylvia Jones, “How many communities will see emergency rooms close this summer because of this government’s failure to act?”

“While the NDP are satisfied with the status quo, I can tell you this government is not,” Jones responded before discussing investments the government has made in incentives to get health care workers to work in remote and rural communities.

“We are investing, we are ensuring the people who want to practise in the province of Ontario have that right through many different programs,” Jones added.

Opening question period on Tuesday, Stiles again pushed for accountability from Jones noting the presence of dozens of local business owners in the gallery and that the closure was transpiring right when the seasonal population of the area soars, meaning that “thousands of Ontarians will have to travel farther and farther away just to access emergency service.”

In response, Jones stated she could “only imagine how challenging this decision was for the Haliburton Highlands Health Services leadership and board,” adding “I am confident that this decision was not taken lightly” before repeating her previous comments about government investments.

VIDEO: NDP Marit Stiles during Question Period – May 30, 2023

But these answers, coupled with Jones’ reluctance to take action and listen to the people of Minden — a point she has repeatedly characterized as a local decision for the Haliburton Highlands Health Service (HHHS) board the government would not interfere in — is not playing well for the local business owners, some of whom identify as Progressive Conservative voters and supporters of Doug Ford.

Mathew Renda of Boshkung Brewing Company, who moved to Minden from Oshawa with his wife in 2020 and is currently a caregiver to his mother-in-law who is living with a heart condition, told reporters that he feels Jones is “oblivious to the whole situation.”

“Her answers to the Opposition’s questions were, at best, uninformed,” Renda continued. “I was very surprised. Clearly they have no indication of the impact this is going to have on the area.”

The impacts include an increase of at least 20 minutes travel time for permanent and seasonal residents of Minden to get to the nearest emergency department in Haliburton once the Minden emergency department closes. This fact is exacerbated for surrounding communities such as Dorset that rely on the services of Minden’s emergency department.

Fears from Minden business owners regarding the potential economic impact of the closure reflect the fact that Minden and surrounding areas are heavily dependent upon summer tourism.

“(In) the winter it turns into a sleepy town and then the summer it becomes lively,” Renda said. “With multiple summer camps and multiple outdoor activities like fishing, surrounded by hundreds of lakes, what are those people do when they have an issue on the lake?”

Dennis Pennie, who operates Minden Auto Centre with his wife, noted he stands to lose approximately 40 per cent of his business in the next five years due to reduced tourism to the area and fewer people choosing to move to or retire in the area. He also expressed concern about the optics for families who would traditionally send their children to camps in communities surrounding Minden.

“Would you send your child to a place that has no hospital and has had the hype we’ve had in the last six weeks?” he asked. “A lot of parents aren’t going to send their kids to our camps and our camps are going to suffer from that.”

Pennie said he was deeply disappointed in Haliburton-Kawartha Lakes MPP Laurie Scott, noting he thought she would be there for her constituents.

“I’ve heard from many other people who have been down here and she has not lifted her head once, never invited us in, and today not even a glance back at us,” Pennie said, referring to the Minden delegation in the public gallery at the Legislature.

Ian Myers, who owns the chimney company Myers Chimney, stated plainly he has withdrawn his support from the PC party, Jones, and Scott over their decision to not intervene.

According to the NDP, accountability agreements signed with every hospital in the province mean Ontario’s health minister approves the closure of hospitals and emergency departments becuase of financial trouble or understaffing. In previous statements, Gélinas expressed skepticism about the Haliburton Highlands Health Services board’s reasoning for permanently closing the Minden emergency department given it hasn’t closed a single time due to understaffing in the past year.

“None of this makes any sense, to say that closing Minden is a decision made by the board and has nothing to do with the minister of health,” Gélinas told the media on Tuesday. “It’s because we have a minister of health that does not understand her responsibility or refuses to take her responsibility. It is on her shoulders. Nobody else.”

Mark Dracup, who owns Rockcliffe Restaurant, Bar & Hotel in Minden, called Jones’ repeated lack of action an instance of “passing the buck.”

“She’s taking no accountability,” he said.

As for the Haliburton Highlands Health Services board, he called the lack of consultation about the closure and the extremely condensed timeline of six weeks since the closure announcement “at best, maybe incompetent, at worst, maybe corrupt.”

According to Dracup, neither he nor anybody else in the community knows how the decision was made and the lack of consultation by the board negates its legitimacy.

NDP MPP Chris Glover said that over the past two and a half decades, Ontarians have been losing democratic control over their hospital boards. He went on to suggest that many hospital boards across the province lack accountability to the communities they serve, casting further doubt on the health minister’s assertion that this was a “local” decision.

“Minden is a warning shot for communities across the province, because we’re already starting to see temporary closures in emergency rooms in many other communities across this province,” Glover added. “The communities have no say because they don’t have control of their hospital boards. So all rural communities in Ontario should be paying attention to what’s happening in Minden, because they could be next.”

While the closure of the Minden emergency department on June 1st appears all but certain, the community members present at the media conference made it clear this was not the end and they would be heeding Glover’s advice.

“We’re not going to stop fighting,” Pennie noted. “You’re going to hear a lot more from us about this.”

This story has been updated to correct Mathew Renda’s name. kawarthaNOW apologizes for the error.

The new MRI machine funded by community donors has arrived at Ross Memorial Hospital in Lindsay.

The five-tonne machine was delivered by truck on Monday (May 29) and hoisted to the ground with a crane. A precision moving team then directed the MRI through the Kent Street entrance and down the main hall, where it was inserted through an open wall into the renovated MRI room.

Magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI, is a noninvasive medical imaging test that produces detailed images of almost every internal structure in the human body, including the organs, bones, muscles, and blood vessels. MRI scanners create images of the body using a large magnet and radio waves.

The new MRI replaces the 12-year-old MRI that was also completely funded by the community through the Imagine the Future campaign. From 2011 to 2023, around 70,000 patient exams were scanned using that MRI. More than 500 patient exams are scanned at Ross Memorial Hospital every month.

“With the support of our donors, Ross Memorial is building our health care infrastructure to keep pace and meet the needs of a rapidly growing population,” says Ross Memorial Hospital Foundation CEO Erin Coons in a media release. “This transformation involves significant investments in technologically advanced medical equipment, including the MRI, that is not covered by government funding. Donors’ support for the We Are The Ross appeal plays an important part of these essential investments.”

The new MRI machine features cutting-edge technology that provides the sharpest image resolution faster than ever before. It can adjust to each patient, which means they are in position sooner, and new tiltable imaging coils are more comfortable for patients with mobility challenges without compromising the resolution quality. High-tech sensors monitor the patient’s breathing and adjust for patients who have difficulty holding their breath for certain tests, such as liver and abdomen imaging.

By delivering the most high-resolution images possible as quickly as possible, the new MRI reduces the amount of time patients must remain still, which is especially important for those with pain, claustrophobia, or limited mobility.

Sharper imaging and image reconstruction technology also help physicians confidently diagnose disease and injury in the brain, spine, joints, breasts, and organs. This includes herniated or bulging disks, arthritic changes, tumours and other lesions. It also enables precision biopsy procedures including breast and future prostate exams.

“MRI provides critically important information necessary for the best, safest patient care,” says Ross Memorial Hospital’s chief of staff Dr. Bharat Chawla. “The more detailed the image, the better and faster our team can diagnose and treat our patients’ concerns. The new MRI also connects to the hospital’s clinical information system, which means every image is automatically attached to the patient’s digital medical record and available to all care providers, including specialists in other regions.

Doube’s Trestle Bridge, a popular spot along the Kawartha Trans Canada Trail between Peterborough and Omemee, will be making an appearance in a movie follow-up to the critically acclaimed mystery comedy-drama television series Monk.

Production crews for Mr. Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie were filming at the bridge — also known as Orange Corners Trestle Bridge — from May 15 to 18. The production is also filming in Toronto, with shooting expected to be completed by May 30.

Created by Andy Breckman, Monk ran from 2002 to 2009 and starred Tony Shalhoub (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, The X-Files, Wings) as Adrian Monk, a former San Francisco homicide detective turned private police consultant who has obsessive-compulsive disorder and multiple phobias. The series won eight Emmy awards and one Golden Globe award.

In the movie follow-up, Shalhoub will reprise his titular role along with original cast members Ted Levine as Captain Leland Stottlemeyer, Jason Gray-Stanford as Lieutenant Randy Disher, Traylor Howard as Monk’s assistant Natalie Teeger, Héctor Elizondo as Monk’s psychiatrist Dr. Neven Bell, and Melora Hardin as Monk’s late wife Trudy Monk. In a script written by Breckman, Monk returns to solve one last case involving his stepdaughter Molly, a journalist who is preparing for her wedding.

Vancouver-born actor Gray-Stanford posted several photos and videos on Instagram of the cast and crew at Doube’s Trestle Bridge and along the Kawartha Trans Canada Trail.

“Beautiful northern Ontario,” Gray-Stanford says in one video he posted on the morning of May 17, when temperatures had dropped close to zero. “Very, very cold today, but very beautiful.”

Mr. Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie is the first production in the City of Kawartha Lakes through the new film office and permitting system, part of the municipality’s economic development team. The film office provides services such as liaising with producers, assisting with the implementation of work required to film in the municipality, and facilitating film permit applications.

Doube’s Trestle Bridge was constructed in 1883 for the Midland Railway’s route between Peterborough and Lindsay. Originally made of wood and 1,500 feet long, the central part of the trestle was later converted to a steel bridge with nine spans totalling 572 feet long.

In 1921, Canadian National Railways took over the route, which was initially used by both passenger and freight trains. Eventually, only freight trains used the route until trains ceased using the route in 1978. The rails were then lifted and the route became the property of the provincial government’s Ontario Realty Corporation. It was eventually leased to Kawartha Rail Trail as a recreational trail that became the Kawartha Trans Canada Trail, and is a popular route for cyclists, hikers, and runners with Doube’s Trestle Bridge being the main attraction with its scenic views.

Mr. Monk’s Last Case: A Monk Movie will be streamed in the U.S. on NBCUniversal’s Peacock service, although no release date has been set. It is unknown whether it will be released in Canada.

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One person is dead following a two-vehicle collision on Highway 7 east of Peterborough near Norwood early Saturday afternoon (May 27).

Peterborough County OPP and emergency crews responded to a collision between an eastbound tractor-trailer and a westbound sport utility vehicle (SUV) that happened just after 1 p.m. on Highway 7 between County Road 38 and Asphodel 3rd Line.

The driver of the SUV was pronounced dead at the scene. Police have not released any other information about the victim. There were no other injuries.

Highway 7 has been closed between County Road 38 and Asphodel 3rd Line while police document the scene.

The cause of the collision remains under investigation.

Anyone who may have witnessed or has video or dash camera footage of the collision and who has not spoken with police is asked to contact the Peterborough County OPP Detachment at 1-888-310-1122.

Alpacas, axe-throwing, inflatable jousting, classic picnic games, food, treats, and fun. These aren’t the elements to a new treatment program, but rather key ingredients for our second annual Backyard Summer Social gala on Saturday, June 24th.

Our signature fundraising event lets adult attendees be kids again as they swap out tux, gown, and heels for T-shirts, shorts, and sandals to celebrate summer. The Backyard Summer Social supports our Building Abilities For Life Campaign that funds high-demand services like speech and occupational therapies to reduce wait times for these essential services.

Our Backyard Summer Social takes place in the backyard space located at the rear of our Peterborough location. Used for outdoor treatment and therapy for kids and clients, the backyard is transformed for the fundraiser — reflecting the recent evolution of the space.

Many years ago, a daycare and classroom operated at Five Counties and the backyard was home to swings, slide, climber, a paved path for bikes, and other play equipment. The daycare eventually closed and the playground equipment was removed. While the backyard has always been used for recreation therapy and other programs, the outdoor space may not have been used to its full potential.

That started to change three years ago at a time when our staff were advocating for the backyard to be better used for treatment and therapy services. With the support of individual donors, local service clubs, businesses, and — most critically — the forging of a partnership with Peterborough GreenUP, the backyard space began its transformation.

Working closely with GreenUP, a therapy garden featuring native plant species (and a sensory area allowing for hands-on exploration by kids) was added in the backyard. Different ‘play’ zones were also introduced, providing opportunities for sensory engagement, therapeutic programming, and unstructured play.

There are many instances of this, including:

• A paved track allows kids who are working on walking skills or developing balance, testing out new mobility equipment, or riding a bicycle for the first time to do those in the backyard area.
• Built-in musical features allow for engagement opportunities, especially for kids who communicate in different ways. For instance, the mushrooms are metal and can double as drums, while the large tubes act as a large metal xylophone.
• A covered awning and the shaded areas under trees allow for a natural group gathering space to carry out different therapies and activities.
• An artificially built hill in the backyard is a natural play space allowing kids to improve gross motor skills and prepare to try out plastic play structures in their local park.
• A stage area is used for music therapy programs, kids’ performances and outdoor camps.

For our kids, clients, families and even staff, the fully accessible outdoor green space is a wonderful addition to our Peterborough site. It provides therapy and treatment options in a low-stress, sensory-sensitive natural environment in which people feel safe.

While at first glance the backyard space may look simple, there are thoughtful complexities weaved throughout. At the core is a return to nature, which our Recreation Therapist Colleen (who frequently uses the backyard space with clients) describes this way.

“Nature isn’t plastic … it’s not contrived,” Colleen notes. “Nature is real and tangible with the trees, flowers, grass, and sun. The opportunities to explore, engage, learn, and discover can be magnified in an outdoor environment. Learning is deeper, memories are better, and the treatment and therapy outcomes can be more substantial.”

Attendees at the Backyard Summer Social on Saturday, June 24th will be able to attest to this for themselves, as the activities offered at the event mirror what our clients experience during treatment.

For example, guests aren’t just mini putting — they are using gross and fine motor skills. This aligns with the experience of the kids we see, as many don’t remember their time here as treatment but more as playtime.

Join us in learning how Five Counties is transforming lives every day — and revitalizing spaces along the way.

With less than a week before the Minden emergency department is set to close for good, NDP health critic and Nickel Belt MPP France Gélinas and Ontario Health Coalition executive director Natalie Mehra held a media conference on Thursday morning (May 25) to again urge accountability from Ontario health minister Sylvia Jones regarding the closure decision by Haliburton Highlands Health Services (HHHS).

On April 20, HHHS initially announced its intention to close the Minden emergency department and consolidate emergency services at the Haliburton hospital, located 25 kilometres northeast of Minden. On April 27, Minden residents travelled to Queens’ Park to deliver a petition that at the time had been signed by over 3,300 individuals living in the Minden area asked Jones to intervene and implement a one-year moratorium on the decision to close the emergency department.

That petition now has nearly 25,000 signatures, according to the Save Minden Ontario Emergency Room Facebook group.

When the petition was brought forward to the legislature by Gélinas, who has served as NDP health critic for 16 years, Jones responded by stating that this was a local decision that had been made “thoughtfully” by HHHS and that the provincial government had no intentions of intervening as to “let them do their work.”

HHHS currently operates two emergency departments that are open 24/7, one at 4575 Deep Bay Road in Minden and the other at 7199 Gelert Road in Haliburton, both with on-site heliports. Unlike the Haliburton location, which has 15 in-patient beds, the Minden location does not offer in-patient acute care services.

HHHS has stated the decision to close the Minden emergency department on June 1 was made because of ongoing staffing shortages that would result in multiple and unpredictable closures of one or both of the emergency departments over the summer.

Much of the criticism of the closure decision from both Minden residents and local politicans relates to a lack of prior consultation and the timing of the closure at the beginning of summer, when Minden’s population triples due to seasonal residents and tourists, as well as the ability of residents to travel to Haliburton — a minimum 20-minute drive from Minden.

At a meeting of Haliburton County council last Tuesday (May 16), Minden Hills Township mayor Bob Carter asked members of the HHHS board to resign following a presentation of their plan to consolidate emergency services at the Haliburton hospital. At that meeting, HHHS CEO Carolyn Plummer said having two emergency departments in the county was no longer sustainable.

“We’ve fought long and hard to keep both sites open, but we’ve reached a point where we’re just not able to do that on a consistent basis anymore,” she said. “I do feel confident that this is the right decision.”

As the date for the closure of Minden’s emergency department, which last year treated over 13,000 patients, looms right at the beginning of the busiest tourism time of year for the region, Minden residents have taken to raising funds to launch a legal challenge to the HHHS decision based on the lack of consultation with both the public, employees, and unions — a point to which both Gélinas and Mehra spoke emphatically.

“There are timelines that have to be respected,” Gélinas said at Thursday’s media conference. “First, they have to post and let people give people at least 60 days notice that they intend to look at a service change. They never did that. They have obligations toward their union. SEIU (Service Employees International Union) has it in their contract that, if they’re going to change any department, they have to give them a five-month notice. None of that happened. All of that rests on the shoulders of the Minister of Health and the Ford government to make sure that the steps are followed.”

To date, the legal fund has yet to raise half of its $100,000 goal. However, attendees of a recent rally in Minden remained confident they would be able to stop the June 1st closure and, should the closure proceed, they would not give up the fight.

For her part, Gélinas said Jones was ultimately accountable for the closure decision.

“Hospitals are the highest priority of a minister of health,” Gélinas said. “No hospital can close an emergency department or close all together without [Jones’] approval. She has to take responsibility, grant [residents and staff] the minimum of one year that they’ve been asking for, and really do the right thing and make sure that this emergency department stays open for years to come.”

Also on Thursday, HHHS acting chief of staff Dr. Norm Bottum released a “community message” reiterating the reasons for the closure.

“Our goal is to ensure our community has a stable and safe emergency care system that you can all count on,” Dr. Bottom wrote. “This means having an emergency department that is open and able to provide quality services — each and every time someone shows up in an emergency department. The safety of our community has been impacted by the multiple, unpredictable, last-minute closures faced by HHHS over the past number of years.”

When asked about the statement by reporters, Gélinas said she didn’t buy the argument and pushed back against the idea that there had been closures at the Minden location.

“The argument is pretty shallow,” she said. “To prevent something that has not happened yet, we will take away the service altogether? [A service] that provided 13,000 people with the emergency care they needed in a high quality way in the last 12 months.”

To this point, Mehra added the whole situation looks like “a decision in search of a rationale.”

“Physicians dispute the claims that HHHS is making regarding staffing the emergency department,” she said.

In response to further questions concerning the lack of consultation, specifically with unions and employees, Gélinas again pointed out these workers had not been granted the requisite five months of notice regarding transfers, but found out about the closure through the media at the same time everyone else in the public did back in April.

“This disconnect between what we hear from the good people at the board and what we hear from the good people of Minden, this has to be cleared up,” Gélinas said. “And this is the job of the Minister of Health. She has all the tools. What we need is the political will and that’s sort of lacking right now.”

For her part, Mehra stated her concerns this closure is merely a sign of more to come. Across Ontario, smaller municipalities are seeing their amalgamated hospital boards work to shut down services in smaller rural centres.

“If they get away with closing Minden and the minister says ‘Oh, it’s a local decision,’ then Welland is next, right?” Mehra said. “Welland is on cue for having its core services closed, almost all of its acute care services and so on. Chesley is at risk. Wingham is at risk. So is Almonte and Alexandria. There’s a whole array of small rural hospitals at the most serious risk.”

According to the NDP, the recemt passage of the Ford government’s Bill 60 (Your Health Act) — which allows for the creation of “integrated community health centres” or private clinics that are able to conduct OHIP-covered surgeries — creates the possibility that investors will set up clinics in communities that have lost publicly funded health services.

“I see the eagerness of the investor to make a pile of money off the back of sick people,” Gélinas warned.

Ontario NDP leader Marit Stiles echoed that warning when she visited and met with Minden residents on Thursday afternoon.

“What happens in Minden is what’s going to happen across this province if we’re not careful,” Stiles said, calling for the provincial government to reverse the closure decision.