Cuts blamed for patient deaths says union head

The union leader of the psychiatry ward staff at CHUM hospitals said that recent budget cuts are to blame for the recent deaths of two patients.

Guy Brochu told the Gazette on Thursday that nurses and other primary health care workers are working long hours. He also said that fatigue could have caused a patient in the psychiatry ward to kill two and wound another of his fellow patients.

The union expressed concern over seven million dollars in cuts to the CHUM budget last year but the pleas fell on deaf ears.

The suspect, thirty one year old Idelson Guerrier is a patient in the psychiatry ward at Notre Dame Hospital. He is accused in the murder of two patients and the attempted murder of another.