Quebec Health Minister Asks Public to Avoid Emergency Rooms Amid Overcrowding

Quebec Health Minister Christian Dubé presented his plan on Dec. 19 to reduce overcrowding in the province’s emergency rooms: the public should avoid going to them if they can. Instead, patients should use their judgment and seek care elsewhere—such as from family medicine clinics, or clinics led by nurse practitioners—if they don’t really need to go to the hospital. “There is a large percentage of people who consult at the emergency department who don’t have an urgent problem,” Mr. Dubé told reporters in Montreal. “I’m not saying they’re not worried, but they don’t have an urgent problem.”...