The Quebec government faces a choice: keep private CHSLDs private, or better support them.

That was the message from the Herron home's lawyer on Wednesday to the coroner investigating first-wave deaths in CHSLDs.

"As part of your recommendations, it will be important for the government to make a choice," said lawyer Alexandre Paradis at the Trois-Rivières courthouse, where the inquest is taking place.

"Do we simply make a decision to no longer have private CHSLDs in the province of Quebec, or rather do we decide to have better support and, despite the fact that it is private, we still consider them an integral part of our health system?"

Paradis is representing the general manager and the owner of the Résidence Herron.

He criticized the health district that oversaw the home, the CIUSSS de l'Ouest-de-l'Île, for its lack of consideration for Herron's requests over the lack of personnel at the start of the pandemic.

For example, he described a call on March 27, 2020 from the home's director, Andrei Stanica, to the CIUSSS about a need for employees. It was unanswered and he had to repeat his request the next day.

Private establishments also became "second-rate customers" in terms of protective equipment, which was mainly reserved for the public sector, said Paradis.

Based on a survey by an association of private health institutions under contract, the lawyer said that many private CHSLDs still do not feel they have the necessary support from the CIUSSS.

"We have two choices," he repeated.

"Are we abolishing or forgetting the private CHSLDs, or are we including them more in the management that is done by the CIUSSS? Because there are no other options," he said.

"We have to be there [for them] or we take them away."

The lawyer representing the CIUSSS de l'Ouest-de-l'Île, Jean-François Pedneault, described instead a lack of cooperation on the part of Herron's management, in particular in providing a list of employees and residents.

He also spoke of a disorganization that already existed at Résidence Herron before the pandemic, which was accentuated with the arrival of COVID-19.

Pedneault said that on March 12, 2020, the CHSLDs received a guide providing for the updating of a contingency plan in the event of a staff shortage.

"A contingency plan in the event of a shortage of personnel is not to call for help when there is no one left -- it is to plan what we would do if there is a shortage of people in significant quantities," he said.

Pedneault detailed that the CIUSSS de l'Ouest-de-l'Île had sent several dozen employees to lend a hand to the CHSLD Herron between the end of March and the beginning of April.

Coroner Géhane Kamel's inquest is looking into the deaths of elderly or vulnerable people in residential settings during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

During this initial wave, from February 25 to July 11, 2020, Quebecers aged 70 and over accounted for 92 per cent of deaths from COVID-19, according to public health data. In total, 5,211 in this group succumbed to the disease in that time.

But the coroner's inquest is limited to events between March 12 and May 1, in order to make recommendations to avoid future tragedies. It is reviewing events at six public care homes and one private one, as a sample. It zeroed in on death from each home to better understand what took place.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Jan. 19, 2022.