The First Class Action Law Suit Against Long-Term Care Homes is Filed

April 30, 2020, Kitchener, Ontario

Posted by: Robert Deutschmann, Personal Injury Lawyer

A class action law suit proposed by a lawyer this week in Ontario alleges that the long term care home where his clients mother died of COVID-19 failed residents. He hopes to hold the companies running the home as accountable for her loss.

Pinta Maguire filed the lawsuit last Friday hoping to have the private corporations take actions that will bring about positive changes to the care provided in the homes. Settlements in such cases do not tend to be large but they are a powerful force for change.

The lawsuit has been brought against Anson Place Care Centre in Hagersville which is a private for profit care home and long term care facility. Mike McCarroll’s 95 year old mother Ruby died on March 30^th. He had been by her bedside three days earlier when she was gravely ill after testing positive for COVID-19. There had already been another death at the home form the virus.

Anson Place has seen 25% of it’s residents die of COVID-19 so far.

Mr. McCarroll had not been informed of the virus being in the home, nore of other deaths from the virus in the home, nor of his mother testing positive until he was at her death bed. Sadly Mrs. McCarroll died alone without any family by her side.

The lawsuit alleges that, “In the months after COVID-19 emerged on the world stage and before any outbreaks in Ontario, the defendants again failed to protect the residents in their homes by not putting in place adequate measures to prepare for and respond to the COVID-19 virus” and goes on to say that the defendants failed to protect residents by repeatedly failing to follow the leadership of public health officials and comply with public health guidance and directivs regarding: (1) outbreak planning; (2) supply, use, and access to PPE. The lawyer goes on to say that this crisis of COVID-19 exposes the private companies for profit.

Having for profit care homes  take care of our most vulnerable citizens for profit, charging considerable sums of money and making profits carries the obligation of safe guarding the residents of the homes they run. The profits care homes make should not be at the cost of the lives of those they look after, nor at the risk of life and health of those who work on the front lines in those homes. The stories of poor staffing ratios, low pay, unstable workforces, poor care, poor food, and poor supplies were common before the COVID-19 crisis. Now these shortcomings have come to a head and resulted in needless deaths and suffering.

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Deutschmann Law serves South-Western Ontario with offices in Kitchener-Waterloo, Cambridge, Woodstock, Brantford, Stratford and Ayr. The law practice of Robert Deutschmann focuses almost exclusively in personal injury and disability insurance matters. For more information, please visit www.deutschmannlaw.com or call us at 1-519-742-7774.

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