On December 22, 2025, Prashant Sreekumar, a 44-year-old father of three, died after waiting more than eight hours to see a doctor in the emergency department at Grey Nuns Hospital in Edmonton.

Prashant arrived at the hospital with severe chest pain. According to his family, he repeatedly told staff he could not bear the pain and rated it 15 out of 10. An ECG was performed, but he was told there was nothing of significance and was asked to continue waiting. He was offered Tylenol while his blood pressure continued to rise.

After more than eight hours in the waiting room, Prashant was finally called into the treatment area. Within seconds, he collapsed and suffered a fatal cardiac arrest. He died without ever seeing a doctor.

Prashant leaves behind a wife and three young children, ages 3, 10, and 14.

This petition is not about blaming individual doctors or nurses, many of whom are overworked and understaffed. This is about a systemic failure that allowed a man with severe chest pain to wait for hours in an emergency room until it was too late.

Canada prides itself on universal healthcare. But when people are dying while waiting for emergency care, something is fundamentally broken.

We call for:

1. National transparency on emergency room wait times

2. Minimum safe staffing standards in ERs across Canada

3. Independent reviews of deaths linked to prolonged ER waits

4. Immediate action plans to protect patients presenting with high-risk symptoms such as chest pain

No family should lose a loved one this way.

No child should grow up asking why their parent never came home.

This should never happen again.