300 health professionals urge the province to stop investing in the LNG industry

Physicians are sounding the alarm on B.C.’s liquefied fossil gas industry (LNG) saying the growth and expansion are worsening the province’s healthcare crisis, through an open letter signed by over 300 health professionals.

In the open letter, the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) and the Canadian Association of Nurses for the Environment (CANE) say the LNG industry is increasing the health costs of climate change, worsening physician shortages and ER closures, and incurring high social costs. It says fracking has direct local health impacts, and natural-gas-powered homes increase healthcare costs across B.C.

At a press conference Tuesday morning, Family Physician and President of CAPE Dr. Melissa Lem says the oil and gas industry is scaring away doctors. She says in the past few years at least seven doctors have closed their practices and moved their families away from Dawson Creek, a community where “fracking in the LNG industry is rampant.”

She says many Dawson Creek doctors leave a few years after opening up a practice because of “the price they’re paying for their health and their family’s health.”

“They said that working in LNG campus pays well, but increases rates of chronic disease and substance abuse because of work camp culture,” said Lem.

“(LNG) will add to the number of hospitalized patients with heart or lung disease, with worsening health due to poor air quality or unhoused patients who crowd the emergency department,” she said. “Or more worried parents whose children’s asthma has worsened due to wildfire smoke.”

Lem says she has personally spoken with several doctors who have told her about their patients, colleagues, friends and family members in a school system with low education standards being diagnosed with rare tumours and deadly cancers.

“Doctors also told me about how they install reverse osmosis water filtration systems in their homes because of their concerns about water quality in their community,” she said. “While other people in the community remain unaware of the potential risks or can’t afford to do so.”

According to the open letter, in 2023 B.C. and Canada experienced their worst wildfire season generating $1.2 billion in health costs in Ontario in just five days.

It adds, the 2021 heat dome killed 619 people in B.C., becoming the worst weather-related mass casualty in Canadian history, and the 2021 atmospheric river and flooding cost the healthcare system over $450 million while interrupting healthcare supply chains and cutting patients off from essential medical care.

The open letter urges the government to temporarily suspend all new hydraulic fracturing development, strengthen regulations and monitoring protocols for air and water quality, better policies to end natural gas tie-ins, provide support to workers and Indigenous communities and make a framework that strengthens the healthcare system in B.C.

“If we want a functional healthcare system in this province, we cannot afford ongoing investment and expansion of the LNG industry,” said Lem.

In a statement to 1130 NewsRadio Wednesday, Minister of Energy, Mines and Low Carbon Innovation Josie Osborne says the NDP government is what stands between B.C. residents and the harms of LNG ahead of the next provincial election.

“Other jurisdictions have different regulations and approaches, but here in B.C. we are continually monitoring the latest evidence to ensure we have strong regulations in place to protect people, communities, and the environment. There’s always more to work to do – but we know what’s at stake: John Rustad denies the science of climate change and has promised to completely abandon B.C.’s climate action plan. He would rip up critical environmental regulations, just like they did before – we can’t risk that,” said Osborne.

She claims that in the coming weeks, the province will be strengthening its methane regulations further to ensure it achieves a 75 per cent reduction by 2030 and near-elimination of methane emissions by 2025.