NB health platform hard to access for francophones

FREDERICTON – New Brunswick’s official languages commissioner says her office has received dozens of complaints from people who could not receive service in French on the province’s eVisitNB health platform. In a report released last month, Shirley MacLean (pictured) said users who tried using the site in French received messages such as, “Unfortunately I am not able to understand your request well enough to provide treatment.”

The commissioner’s office received 58 complaints between April 1, 2023, and March 31, 2024, alleging a lack of service in French on the eVisitNB website, but MacLean said the problem goes back further.

On Sept. 15, 2022, someone using New Brunswick’s virtual health platform selected French as their preferred language and were given a warning: “Important: deselecting English may increase your wait time. Are you sure?”

MacLean said the complaints highlight how evolving technology can be problematic if language rights are not considered. The legislature committee on official languages is scheduled to meet to discuss her findings.

“The investigation determined, among other things, not only that there was no active offer of service but that the institution placed the onus on members of the public to select or change their language settings in order to request and receive service in French,” she said in her report.

“These additional steps did not exist for users wishing to continue in English. The delays encountered by francophone users and the solutions offered by the service provider constitute an accommodation provided to an official language group, in this case the official linguistic minority. These measures do not amount to the delivery of services of equal quality in both official languages.”

The private company eVisitNB Inc. provides a platform for virtual medical consultations on behalf of the Department of Health, which makes the service subject to the province’s Official Languages Act, she said. It is the duty of the third-party provider – in this case the eVisitNB platform – to offer service in both official languages at the first point of contact, the report said.

On May 24, 2023, MacLean’s office received a complaint alleging a request for online service, written in French, was denied twice via an English-only message that read: “cannot understand what you wrote, sorry.”

The person complained they were “forced” to submit the request in English to get service.