BC Nurses’ Union wants metal detectors, safety screenings at hospitals

Content warning: This story contains references to suicide. If you or a loved one is at risk of self-harm, the BC Crisis Centre can be reached at 1-800-784-2433. Translation services are available.

There’s a new call from the BC Nurses Union (BCNU) to increase safety in the province’s hospitals amid growing concerns from members.

That ask also includes a request for metal detectors to be installed at the entrances to healthcare facilities across the province.

Ultimately, this is about keeping nurses and other health care workers safe, not to mention patients and everyone else in hospitals, BC Nurses Union President Aman Grewal says.

“It’s something that you never would have considered, but now you have to consider it,” Grewal told CityNews in an interview.

“We need to protect our nurses and their safety, and if that is one thing that we can do, right off the get-go as people walk in the door, are being checked — the way you are when you go to a hockey game or to the stadium, that you go through a metal detector.”

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But there are concerns from some that security measures like this would violate various individual rights, including privacy. Advocates also argue certain communities could be adversely affected.

“The safety of nurses and health care workers is critically important,” Vibert Jack, the BC Civil Liberties Association’s litigation director, told CityNews. “They deserve a safe work environment. If there’s incidents of weapons coming into healthcare facilities, that’s a serious issue and ought to be addressed. We would have concerns though with this proposal.

“We would be concerned about the risk for marginalized groups, especially racialized people, Indigenous people, who have negative experiences with law enforcement, and other types of security measures. It could create barriers for them to seek health care treatment that they need.”

Grewal acknowledges this isn’t ideal but feels it has become necessary.

“We need to be protecting the rights of members to have a safe work environment as well, so we need to balance that out,” Grewal said. “And that’s not up to us nurses to determine. It’s up to the government and WorkSafeBC to put those pieces in place.”

The calls from the union come as CityNews learned a patient at a psychiatric facility was able to bring a homemade gun into the Penticton Regional Hospital last month.

The patient used the gun on themselves, and the RCMP has said staff and patients were not directly threatened. That assessment doesn’t take away the fear that some nurses now have about going to work.

CityNews has reached out to the health ministry for comment on this story.