AS ORIGINALLY ANNOUNCED, in a strange press release, all that was going to happen was that there was going to be a change in the sort of laboratory services offered Dufferin's doctors and their patients.

For some reason, the "pilot" project involving teamwork between the Hospitals In Common Laboratory (HICL) service and Headwaters Health Care Centre was going to be replaced by service from a U.S.-based corporation favoured by the Ontario government and its Central West Local Health Integration Network (LHIN).

Without a doubt, the HICL service has been as excellent as it has been popular, with nurses taking blood samples, doing ECG tests and a broad spectrum of other work and the Headwaters lab completing the work on an overnight basis.

Instead, CML Healthcare is apparently going to bring in some staff at local clinics and send the samples to a regional lab in Mississauga.

What this really means, according to the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU), is that Headwaters will be laying off staff to the detriment of services to patients in both Shelburne and Orangeville.

"Despite the hospital's assurances that patient care will not be affected, the reality is that the timely and seamless flow of information between the patient's doctor, the lab, and the hospital will be disrupted," said OPSEU President Warren (Smokey) Thomas.

Money saved at the expense of patient care? Really?