The opposition MHA for Terra Nova is concerned for the health of residents in his district following the loss of several internal medicine specialists from the hospital in Clarenville.

Lloyd Parrott raised the issue in the House of Assembly yesterday.

Parrott says a couple of months ago the hospital had four such physicians, now they have none.

The reason for the departure, according to Parrott, is a discrepancy in pay between internal medicine doctors practicing in rural vs urban areas.

Health Minister John Hogan says Parrott did write him about the issue in July, and the health authority became aware of resignations on Friday and are working to resolve the issue.

Hogan says there is one internal medicine doctor in the area that can work weekdays Monday through Friday for the next couple of weeks while NLHS works on the vacancies.

He asserts it is not a rural issue.

He says there as an agreement in place between the health authority and the NLMA, and all internal medicine physicians are paid in accordance with that.

Parrott is not impressed with Hogan’s response to his concerns.

He says he gave government an opportunity to fix the situation since July, “the warnings were very clear that this would happen, and now it’s happening, and nothing has been done.”