The board of the London Health Sciences Centre have fired president and C-E-O Paul Woods over his repeated travel to the U-S to visit family.
The board had initially supported Woods when it reported on Friday he had made five trips south of the border amid the pandemic, including over Christmas.
But it announced a change of position yesterday after the announcement touched off a public backlash.
LHSC’s statement can be found below…
Effective immediately, the Board of Directors of London Health Sciences Centre has decided to end Dr. Paul Woods’ employment as LHSC’s President and Chief Executive Officer.
The Board is committed to ensuring the stability of our organization during this global pandemic and we recognize the unprecedented efforts and dedication of hospital staff and physicians. The Board’s responsibility is to act in the best interests of LHSC and the communities it serves and this decision responds to hospital and community concerns about recent news of Dr. Woods’ travel outside Canada during the pandemic. It has become clear that this situation has affected the confidence of staff, physicians and the community in Dr. Woods’ leadership.
While the Board was aware of Dr. Woods’ personal circumstances, it had no advance notice of and did not approve his travel outside Canada. There is no process for the Board of a public hospital to approve a chief executive officer’s personal travel.
None of the elected directors of the Board of LHSC have travelled outside of Canada since the onset of the pandemic.
LHSC’s Board of Directors would like to thank Dr. Woods for his service.
The interim President and Chief Executive Officer of LHSC will be announced in the coming days and LHSC will not be commenting further at this time.
