{"id":482364,"date":"2026-02-18T05:53:30","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T05:53:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/482364\/"},"modified":"2026-02-18T05:53:30","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T05:53:30","slug":"vitalite-can-expand-virtual-care-cheaper-but-no-one-asked-ceo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/482364\/","title":{"rendered":"Vitalit\u00e9 can expand virtual care cheaper, but no one asked: CEO"},"content":{"rendered":"

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New Brunswick<\/a>News<\/a>The Issues<\/a>Health care<\/a><\/p>\n

Horizon, Vitalit\u00e9 weren\u2019t given option to take over virtual care services<\/p>\n

Published Feb 16, 2026 \u00a0\u2022\u00a0 Last updated 10\u00a0hours ago \u00a0\u2022\u00a0 5 minute read<\/p>\n

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\"SusanPremier Susan Holt is pictured here in this file photo. BRUNSWICK NEWS ARCHIVESArticle content<\/p>\n

Premier Susan Holt has thrown her support behind a new virtual health-care deal after initially raising questions on social media amid public outcry.<\/p>\n

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Negotiations are currently underway with Foundever, a Luxembourg-headquartered firm that beat out New Brunswick-based eVisitNB through a request-for-proposal process for the province\u2019s virtual care contract.<\/p>\n

\u201cI went through every step of the RFP process with the team \u2013 the scoring, the background of the company, where their staff are located, where the data would be stored, where the health-care staff would be based and about the company\u2019s roots in New Brunswick,\u201d Holt said in a statement Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m convinced that this is in the best interest of New Brunswickers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brunswick News had requested an interview with Holt on Tuesday to ask what, if any, role eVisitNB will play in virtual care moving forward after she indicated on social media that the government is \u201clooking at creative options to find a win-win here\u201d given the company has \u201cworked hard\u201d and served the province for years.<\/p>\n

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Brunswick News also wanted to ask the premier about the revelation that Vitalit\u00e9 Health Network has indicated it has the capacity to expand its virtual care services but wasn\u2019t asked to do so. The newspaper was not provided an interview with the premier.<\/p>\n

Last week, Dr. France Desrosiers, president and CEO of Vitalit\u00e9 Health Network, told a legislative committee that the regional health authority could not only expand virtual care services but do so at a cheaper cost.<\/p>\n

Desrosiers revealed this insight under questioning from Progressive Conservative MLA Rob Weir during a legislative committee last week.<\/p>\n

About 20 per cent of Vitalit\u00e9 visits are already happening virtually through its primary care system, Desrosiers told public accounts committee members in French.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have the capability to offer the complete service, but we were not asked if we could offer it,\u201d Desrosiers continued. \u201cWe would have the capability and at a lesser cost.\u201d<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s not known how much Foundever will cost New Brunswick taxpayers once it takes over provincewide virtual care services<\/a> this spring.<\/p>\n

In a statement Monday, Progressive Conservative MLA Bill Hogan drew attention to privacy concerns, referring to a 2022 data breach involving the Florida-based Sitel Group (now known as Foundever).<\/p>\n

According to a March 2022 press release, the Sitel Group took \u201cswift action to contain the attack and to notify and protect any potentially impacted clients\u201d who were part of the impacted Sykes network, which had been acquired a year prior by Sitel.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany New Brunswickers have emailed the premier and copied me, concerned with the care of their personal medical data taken from eVisit, a New Brunswick company with 100% Canadian data storage, and given to an American firm with a huge blemish on their record just three years ago, and data storage in the U.S. and accessible worldwide,\u201d Hogan, the PCs\u2019 health critic, said in his statement.<\/p>\n

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Brunswick News has repeatedly requested an interview with a representative of Foundever. No one has been made available to date.<\/p>\n

Margaret Melanson, president and CEO of Horizon Health Network, told the legislative committee last week that her regional health authority also wasn\u2019t involved in the RFP process.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly we heard about the new provider probably the same way many of you did through the media,\u201d Melanson told MLAs during her appearance before the public accounts committee last week.<\/p>\n

As of April 1, Foundever is expected to replace eVisitNB, the latter of which was started by two New Brunswick physicians as an out-of-pocket health-care option in 2020.<\/p>\n

The virtual care service started to be publicly funded in 2022 thanks to the then Higgs Progressive Conservative government.<\/p>\n

Melanson described eVisitNB as a \u201cgodsend\u201d during the COVID-19 pandemic as it provided episodic care through its standalone system for those afraid to leave their homes to seek medical treatment.<\/p>\n

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Deputy Health Minister Eric Beaulieu has indicated that better integration with the primary care system was the main improvement the government was looking for through the next virtual care service contract.<\/p>\n

eVisitNB is already integrated with Tele-Care 811, allowing for 811 nurses to book virtual care appointments on behalf of callers, according to Dr. Hanif Chatur, co-founder and CEO of eVisitNB.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur current integration with Tele-Care 811 clearly demonstrates our capacity to continue integrating with emergency departments, NB Health Link and primary care clinics,\u201d Chatur said in an email.<\/p>\n

Melanson admitted to the committee that Horizon didn\u2019t attempt to connect its systems with eVisitNB. She explained that the transition to electronic medical records and a clinical information system is already underway in the province.<\/p>\n

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A digital health strategy highlighting both of those initiatives was rolled out by the Holt government Friday.<\/p>\n

Even if Horizon had decided to connect with eVisitNB, Melanson said there would have been privacy and \u201cother issues\u201d to sort out, and while not \u201cinsurmountable,\u201d the RHA knew the virtual care service contract was headed to an RFP process.<\/p>\n

Green party Leader David Coon questioned<\/a> last week the province\u2019s deputy health minister on why Horizon and Vitalit\u00e9 couldn\u2019t take over providing the virtual care service.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you want to integrate these two things more closely, then you bring the virtual health-care services into the public health-care system, not farm it out to a private company, and worse, farm it out to a private company that\u2019s not even inside New Brunswick that doesn\u2019t know how our system works,\u201d Coon later told reporters.<\/p>\n

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On Tuesday, the New Brunswick Health Coalition publicly released a letter addressed to the premier, asking her, given Vitalit\u00e9\u2019s revelation, to \u201cexplain to the public why this virtual health service cannot be done by our public health system.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last week, Beaulieu told the public accounts committee that there\u2019s a \u201ccertain level of expertise\u201d required to operate a virtual platform, and given existing primary care challenges, \u201cdiverting the attention of the (regional health authorities) into a virtual system could be challenging.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Desrosiers disputed that assessment of the situation on the ground.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuring the pandemic, the (New Brunswick Medical Society) offered the equipment to all the doctors who were interested in virtual services, so the majority of them started to do so,\u201d she told the committee in French.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not all the doctors who do it \u2013 we agree on that \u2013 but the majority offer the services that can be offered in a different way. Some do it by phone, some do it by video, but the equipment and the expertise are already in our teams.\u201d<\/p>\n

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