“Nobody can be against pharmacare,” says federal health minister
This week’s edition of who is saying what about public health care is compiled by Pat Van Horne.
Federal health minister says “everything is still on the table” on pharmacare
“Nobody can be against pharmacare, but… we are in a very special context right now… Everything is still on the table, and we are tracking those [agreements] that have already been done to see how it works… Then, we’ll see for the rest,” said Health Minister Marjorie Michel to iPolitics on September 2, 2025.
The case for public health care
“We heard from a woman in Ottawa this past year. She’s 80 years old. She went to a private eye surgery clinic. She was told it was going to cost her $11,000 for her cataract surgery.. and she was told she had to pay a down payment of $1,500 to get her surgery. She contacted us to see if this was true. This is totally untrue. Your listeners should know that cataract surgeries, which is where they have privatized a lot, are totally covered, that means your eye measurement tests, the surgery itself, the eye drops that are associated with the surgery, all of that is covered by OHIP, and if you are told that you have to pay to get it in a timely fashion, that’s untrue,” said Natalie Mehra in response to Dr. Shawn Whatley’s case for privatizing health care to CBC Ottawa on September 3, 2025.
Address labour shortage in health care by treating temporary foreign workers fairly
“We need to address these labour shortages … but it’s by giving people full status… If we want to promote good patient care, then we have to make sure that workers who are providing that care are treated fairly,” said Danyaal Raza, family physician and assistant professor at the University of Toronto’s department of family and community medicine, to the Toronto Star, August 27, 2025.
Manitoba not catching up to reduce ER wait times
“The only way to substantially reduce ER wait times is to hire more front-line health-care workers, add more staffed beds to medical wards and improve patient flow through hospitals to alleviate bottlenecks in emergency rooms… According to the NDP’s 2025 provincial budget, Manitoba hired 1,255 net new front-line workers in health care across the province since taking office, including doctors and nurses, and added 233 fully staffed hospital beds… The budget also allocated $47-million to open 97 new beds, including 60 acute care, 10 critical care, and 27 transitional care beds. But it’s clearly not being felt on the front lines… Almost every hospital in Winnipeg has seen an increase in ER or urgent care wait times over the past year,” wrote Tom Brodbeck in the Winnipeg Free Press, September 2, 2025
Environment and health care are not separate issues
“A combined approach by federal, provincial and municipal governments to escalate a transition away from fossil fuels to renewable energy has the potential to create a safer and healthier environment, clean air, less suffering from the ongoing effects of continued greenhouse gas emissions, and a stronger economy,” wrote Richard van der Jagt, retired hematologist/oncologist and adjunct professor of medicine at the University of Ottawa and Geoff Strong, client scientist in The Hill Times, August 25, 2025
U.S. fires director of public health agency
“The loss of experienced, world-class infectious disease experts at the Center for Disease Control (CDC) is directly related to the failed leadership of extremists currently in charge of the Department of Health and Human Services. They make our country less safe and less prepared for public health emergencies,” said Michael Osterholm, University of Minnesota infectious disease researcher, about the firing of CDC Director Susan Monarez, to CTV News, August 28, 2025
Growing demand for Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) in Quebec
“You’ll see in the coming years, there will be more and more medical assistance in dying that can be offered in different palliative care homes, but also at home and also in hospital centres,” said Sonia Bélanger, Quebec minister responsible for seniors, to CBC, September 1, 2025
Saskatchewan Health Authority should assign doctors where they’re needed, says health policy analyst
“Some doctors have literally rosters of a few hundred patients and others have over 2,000 patients… We don’t know much about why that is. And is that a good thing or a bad thing? Are some doctors over-serving their patients? Are some doctors under-serving their populations because they just don’t have enough time to serve them adequately?” said BC-based Health Policy Analyst Steven Lewis, to CBC, August 30, 2025
Who is keep track of health care job losses in B.C.?
“Over the past several months, (Fraser Health has) been taking a close look at how our organization operates in parallel to the regional health authority reviews. Our goal is to find ways to work more efficiently and reduce administrative costs so that we can direct as many of our resources as possible to continue to provide care and service to our patients, families and communities,” said Fraser Health Authority spokesperson Amory Wong to the Vancouver Sun, August 29 2025
Virtual waiting room at home? Sault Ste. Marie pilot project aims to cut ER visits
“The emergency room is a very unpredictable environment, and our priority is, of course, always the highest acuity patients… We don’t want low-acuity patients to have to wait a large amount of time in our waiting rooms because they can be very crowded — and crowding, of course, as we know from the pandemic, can lead to a greater risk for infection and also decreases patient satisfaction and reduces our overall efficiency. . . The patient can log on to our website and if they are eligible, they can register online and join the queue . . .They’ll then receive, every hour, a notification that we acknowledge their wait and then they’ll receive a notification that we’re ready for them and they should start to proceed to the emergency room to be seen,” said Dr. Stephen Smith, emergency physician and hospital’s vice-president of medical affairs at Sault Area Hospital in Sault Ste. Marie, to CTV News, August 28, 2025
