The BC government says 90 per cent of elective surgeries that were postponed because of the pandemic last spring have now been done.

Between May 18 and Nov. 12, there were 164,000 surgeries done in B.C.

Health Minister Adrian Dix was asked if we may hit a pressure point in hospitals during the second wave of the pandemic, which could lead to more surgeries being postponed.

“We’re hopeful that that’s not the case. We obviously learned from the spring, and what happened in the spring, so that’s not what we’re looking at. But that’s always an option, should it be required.”

Ministry of Health consultant Michael Marchment says the government was quite pleased to be at 90 per cent completion within six months of resuming elective surgeries.

And Marchment says the province expects to be at 100 per cent within the next three months.

“Sometimes you schedule people, and because of a particular reason they can’t make the surgery. So there are occassions when that happens. And so it is always hard to get that last 10 per cent, but we are actively working on it.”

To help catch up on surgeries, the province has hired 755 healthcare professionals, and 264 of those hirings are in Interior Health.

Dix has estimated it would cost $250 million to catch up on the backlog of elective surgeries, mostly tied to the costs of hiring more staff. He initially said it would take up to two years to do all the elective surgeries that were postponed last spring.