PCs announce $1.4B in new funds for primary health-care plan on eve of election call

The Progressive Conservative government has announced $1.4 billion in new funding for an action plan to connect two million more people in Ontario with a primary care provider, just days before an early provincial election is set to be triggered. 

The funding will help a team led by former federal health minister Dr. Jane Philpott implement its plan to create and/or expand 305 primary care teams throughout the province, which the government says will connect 300,000 more people to primary care this year. 

The teams are typically made up of a family doctor or nurse practitioner working alongside other health-care professionals, such as nurses, physician assistants and dieticians. 

The goal is to have everyone currently on the province's waitlist for a family physician paired with a primary care provider by 2026, Philpott said. 

"Ontario is embarking on a historic opportunity to build a primary care system where the guarantee of access to a primary care team is as automatic as a child being assigned to a school in their community," Philpott said at a news conference Monday morning. 

"This plan is ambitious, and the changes won't happen overnight." 

Last October, the province announced that they had tapped Philpott to lead the newly created team with a mandate to connect every person in Ontario to a primary care provider within the next five years. 

The announcement comes just two days before Premier Doug Ford is set to trigger a 28-day election campaign. 

However, Health Minister and Deputy Premier Sylvia Jones denied the news was a campaign promise. 

"The plan is in place, that work will continue, and we now have that opportunity to build that excitement," she said.

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Opposition party leaders questioned the timing of the announcement.

Ontario Liberal Party Leader Bonnie Crombie says this should have been done in 2018, shortly after Ford first came to power.

NDP Leader Marit Stiles accused the Ford government of making last-minute promises "that they'll never deliver." 

"I think Ontarians aren't going to buy this from the [Progressive] Conservative government again. You had your chance," she said.

The $1.4 billion is on top of $400 million in already-approved funding earmarked for improving primary care, the province said in a news release. 

The Ontario Medical Association has warned 2.5 million people across Ontario don't have a family doctor and that number will grow to more than 4.4 million people by 2026. 

In a statement Monday, the association said it welcomes the funding but more needs to be done to retain and attract family physicians in the province. 

"We have to modernize support for family medicine and many other specialties to make certain they are there when Ontarians needs them," said Dr. Dominik Nowak, president of the association.