A report released in April 2024 features evidence from more than a hundred patients about user fees being charged in Ontario’s private clinics. This report features 18 in-depth case studies of patients who were charged when they went in for cataract surgeries. It also includes 231 responses from a patient survey about extra-billings and user fees.

A report released by the Ottawa and Ontario Health Coalitions contains shocking revelations about the ownership and management behind private health clinics in Ottawa. Based on a five-month investigation, Freedom of Information requests, corporate filings, interviews and court records, the report paints a picture of a dangerous and disturbing “Wild West” of private clinics operating with little or no oversight.

A new report, Robbing from the public to build the private: The Ford government’s hospital privatization scheme reveals that local hospitals in every region of Ontario have operating rooms sitting idle the majority of the time. The public has funded local hospitals for more than 70 years to build operating room capacity that is unused while the Ford government is shunting unprecedented public money to private for-profit clinics and hospitals to build new operating rooms, the Coalition reports.

Across Ontario, vital hospital services, such as emergency departments, maternity and obstetrics, outpatient laboratories and intensive care units, have been subject to repeated closures in the last three years. Those closures were unprecedented. Now, the Coalition found that the number of emergency department closures has increased even more. Not only are emergency departments shuttered for evenings, overnights, weekends or weeks and months at a time, but so too are labour and delivery units, obstetrics, outpatient laboratories, urgent care centres and intensive care units. The duration of closures is getting longer. Multiple towns across regions are closing vital services at the same time. Public notice is often last minute.

The Cambie Case is an important policy decision with massive impact on our cherished public healthcare systems that many Canadians are not familiar with. Adjudicated in British Columbia, this four-year-long trial began in 2016 and ended in 2020. Fortunately, the Provincial Court of BC recently made the decision to rule against privatizing health care financing.

The lack of family doctors continues to make the news as some five million people across the country are without a primary physician.

Canadian healthcare systems across the country are in trouble and the problems they are facing cannot be fixed with more money.

Doreen Nicoll interviews Natalie Mehra, the executive director of the Ontario Health Coalition on Rabble Radio.

Toronto Star article explaining how this legislation smooths the way to funnel public money to private LTC homes

A complete list of all Long Term Care (LTC Homes) in Ontario. Searchable by name of home.

Article referenced at fall summit during discussion about private clinics.

Stories of Courage and Determination in the Face of Covid

A book from the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions