Alberta is considering paying some doctors more than $500 an hour to treat swine flu patients if there is a pandemic.

The pay rate is part of a proposal being worked on by the province and the Alberta Medical Association. It would apply to doctors who volunteered to work as part of a government flu response plan that would kick in if the health system were significantly disrupted by H1N1 or if a state of public-health emergency were declared.

Doctors who agreed to work night shifts under the Physician Financial Support Program would be paid $518.45 an hour, according to a letter the association has sent to doctors.

'There is a component of incentives to continue to work and be there at the toughest times.'—Dr. Noel Grisdale, Alberta Medical Association

The rate for evenings would be $403.24 an hour and the weekday rate would be $259.23 an hour.

Dr. Noel Grisdale, association president, said it's prudent to have a contingency plan because doctors could end up contracting the flu on the job.

Grisdale said in an extreme case, it's possible that 25 per cent of doctors could become ill and be unable to work. If that were to happen, it would be important to have others step in at hospitals, including doctors from community practices.

"In a pandemic, health-care workers are on the frontline exposed to the virus and to the sickest people. In an emergency-type situation, you need as many of those people [doctors] working," Grisdale said in an interview.

"There is a component of incentives to continue to work and be there at the toughest times."

The pay rates would be a significant raise for community doctors, but less so for surgeons and other specialists, he said. Details as to exactly how the program would work and apply to different medical specialties are still being worked out.

Nurses haven't been consulted yet

The organization that represents 32,000 registered nurses in Alberta says it also wants to be included in the government's pandemic planning, but hasn't been consulted yet.

Mary-Anne Robinson, executive director of the College and Association of Registered Nurses of Alberta, said the province is already short about 1,500 RNs, yet they would deliver much of the acute care during a serious flu pandemic.

"Alberta Health Services has not been actively recruiting nurses. Largely there has been a freeze on hiring," Robinson said. "We do wonder what kind of situation that is going to place us in if large numbers of nurses are ill or affected by the pandemic themselves and are unable to work."

Robinson said her organization must be involved if the province wants to hire retired nurses in the event of a serious swine flu outbreak. The retirees would have to be checked to ensure that they qualified to provide safe care, she pointed out.

No cost estimates for contingency plan

The United Nurses of Alberta, the union that represents most registered nurses, hasn't been contacted by the government either, a union official said.

Alberta Health spokesman John Tuckwell declined to comment on the plan for doctors or other pandemic health-care staffing.

Tuckwell said the government continues to develop its pandemic contingency plan but he declined to release any details or cost estimates.

Swine flu is transmitted from animals to humans mainly on pig farms where farmers and workers are in close contact with live pigs. The virus cannot be contracted through eating pork.

The spread of the virus from human to human happens in the same way as seasonal flu, through coughing or sneezing.