Advocates call for government oversight as COVID-19 crisis unfolds at Amberwood Suites in Sudbury

Paramedic vehicles are parked outside the Amberwood Suites retirement home in Sudbury, as a crisis inside unfolds.

On Jan. 5 a COVID-19 outbreak was declared, involving 35 cases, with 32 residents and three staff members testing positive for the virus.

Since last Friday, the outbreak has left three residents dead and 12 others are being cared for in the COVID ward at Health Sciences North. 

The circumstances have both advocates and families calling for government oversight into retirement facilities in Ontario.

Sudbury Mayor Brian Bigger has offered his condolences to the families who have lost loved ones to the outbreak. 

'So many of them are struggling'

"It's a horrible feeling to know that COVID-19 is in an environment where there are seniors who are vulnerable and so many of them are struggling and three of them have now passed away," he said. 

Bigger said the the city took action quickly to get the outbreak under control, which has included a team of community paramedics who are currently monitoring and providing care to the residents who remain at the home. 

Right now the trust with Amberwood is gone.— France Gélinas, NDP MPP and health critic

"We ... went into full support mode, 24/7 monitoring is being provided. We're doing everything that we can within the home," he said. 

Even so, NDP MPP and health critic France Gélinas says the situation has highlighted significant issues with the province's retirement homes. 

Independent third party

Unlike long-term care homes which are regulated by the government, Gélinas says, retirement homes like Amberwood are privately owned. They answer to the Retirement Homes Regulatory Authority, which she says is paid for and run by the private sector that it is supposed to be regulating. 

You can hear the distress in their voices, you can hear how worried they are for their loved ones.— France Gélinas, NDP MPP and health critic

"Right now the trust with Amberwood is gone," she said.

"What we want is the government to pay for an independent third party who will come in and have a look and reassure the ... residents that are presently locked in their units that they will be safe and that everything is being done to keep them safe, to rebuild the trust." 

"They are scared for their lives." 

Gélinas said residents were concerned that the home did not offer up information on the outbreak soon enough, leaving room for anxiety and fear. Since then, she said, the home has apologized to residents. 

However, Gélinas said as a result trust between the home and residents has dissolved, leaving residents and their loved in a state of anxiety.

"They want reassurance, the families that call," she said.

"The calls are really, really hard to listen to. You can hear the distress in their voices, you can hear how worried they are for their loved ones," she said. 

The CBC requested an interview with Autumwood Mature Lifestyle Communities, which operates the retirement home but the company declined an interview.

Amberwood residents make up 12 of the 13 COVID patients in a special isolation unit on the 6th floor of the south tower at the Sudbury hospital. 

CEO Dominic Giroux says none of them are in intensive care and two were recently discharged.

"The health condition of some of our COVID patients is improving, so this may lead to more patients discharged from hospital in the coming days," he said.

But Health Sciences North has had four patients die of COVID last week— three from Amberwood and one who was transferred from Kirkland Lake.

Giroux says there is "increased trepidation" among the staff, but he says they currently have nine critical care beds open that could take COVID patients from overwhelmed hospitals in southern Ontario. 

"This is what we prepared for," he said.  

"We're doing well in Sudbury compared with other parts of the province and we want to keep it that way."

More CBC Sudbury Stories