REALITY CHECK: CEOs profit in the face of COVID deaths

With roughly 70% of Canada’s COVID related deaths directly linked to long-term care facilities, our nation’s care for seniors has been tragic. This evidence is further punctuated by Canada having the worst record of long-term care COVID deaths than all other wealthy nations.

The majority of these long-term care deaths came from for-profit facilities where inflated CEO salaries and shareholder dividends are the norm. Over 750 residents and workers died from COVID in Extendicare, Chartwell and Sienna Living facilities.

And what has been the response to this broken system? How have their executives been held accountable?

HEADLINE: Long-term care home operators paid 2020 bonuses to top executives amid COVID-19 pandemic - Globe & Mail, May 5, 2021

HEADLINE: Chartwell hikes executive bonuses, gives high marks for pandemic response - Globe & Mail, Apr 18, 2021

Their top executives profited handily:

• Extendicare CEO Mike Guerriere - $1.7 million salary + $467,630 bonus
• Chartwell CEO Vlad Volodarski - $1.91 million salary + $323,967 bonus
• Sienna Living CEO Nitin Jain - $1.23 million salary + $336,375 bonus

Worse yet, these companies collected COVID subsidies of $138.5 million through Canadian Emergency Wage Subsidy.

Justin Trudeau has done nothing to hold these companies to account for their shameful negligence or their breathtaking greed—and he has no intention to.

Canadians deserve better.