Posts Tagged ‘privatization’
Carney’s new nation-building plan lacks a vision for our social, educational and health needs
Wednesday, June 11th, 2025
We all need good work, housing, education, health care, child care, clean water, safe food and environmental protection. These must be central to our idea of a transformed Canada. All require immediate government attention. They can’t be relegated to the background, in deference to corporate demands for a wide-open economy where regulations and taxes don’t hold things back. Our economic rethinking must extend to developing new guardrails on business entry into the care economy.
Tags: economy, ideology, privatization, standard of living
Posted in Child & Family Policy Context | No Comments »
As Ontario pumps millions into private health care, public health will continue to suffer
Wednesday, June 11th, 2025
Private facilities seem like a quick fix, but it leaves the public system with fewer health-care workers, which only further exacerbates public wait times. It’s a domino effect that’s difficult to stop. But stop it must. Longer-term strategies are needed. Ontario’s decision to fund primary care teams is a major step in the right direction, but simultaneously funding private facilities will only further erode access to public ones. It’s a downward spiral that Ontario continues to actively fund… Half a billion dollars spent on private health facilities leaves half a billion dollars less to pay for public ones.
Tags: featured, Health, ideology, privatization
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
Ontario’s nurse practitioners urge province for clarity on publicly funded care
Saturday, January 18th, 2025
Canada has witnessed the arrival of companies offering for-profit medical care, including care delivered online, in which patients are charged a fee to access primary care from both doctors and NPs. Holland’s office said the minister’s new interpretation of the Canada Health Act leaves it up to the provinces and territories to decide if virtual health services are incorporated into their public health plans.
Tags: Health, jurisdiction, privatization
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
Does the Canada Health Act require reinterpretation, or a more fundamental rethink?
Thursday, January 16th, 2025
The Canada Health Act clearly states that “physician services” and “hospital services” are covered by medicare. There is nothing about “physician-equivalent services.” … But, if some of the work of NPs, pharmacists and midwives is to be considered essential, what about psychologists, physiotherapists and other allied health professionals? And while we’re at it: Should everything doctors do be considered medically necessary and covered by medicare?
Tags: Health, ideology, jurisdiction, privatization
Posted in Health Policy Context | No Comments »
Is paying out-of-pocket for medically necessary care allowed? Doctors and nurses say patients need to know now
Wednesday, November 20th, 2024
… Canada has seen a rise of for-profit medical care in which patients pay out-of-pocket to access primary care through private clinics, virtual platforms or nurse practitioners, who are not covered by provincial health plans… the Canada Health Act’s silence regarding non-physician health-care providers creates a loophole “that certain health-care providers and their clinics are taking advantage of, knowing there is no legal consequence or risk of getting shut down.”
Tags: budget, Health, jurisdiction, privatization
Posted in Health Policy Context | No Comments »
The rise and fall of co-op housing in Ontario
Tuesday, November 5th, 2024
Toward the end of the last century, the construction of co-operative housing — and social housing more broadly — garnered substantial federal and provincial investments: thousands of co-operative units were built every year for a span of nearly three decades. But a nexus of political, economic, and social factors in the late 1990s ground the breakneck pace of construction to a crawl. Today, units in co-operative buildings are coveted by those looking for affordable-housing options in an increasingly unaffordable market.
Tags: economy, housing, ideology, jurisdiction, privatization, rights, standard of living
Posted in Child & Family Policy Context | No Comments »
Ontario cannot allow a few for-profit child care owners to run roughshod over the $10-a-day child care plan
Monday, October 28th, 2024
The problem with [the cheque-in-the-mail approach or as they like to put it “fund the families directly” with a government tax credit or voucher] as a child-care plan is it’s one that works for for-profit child care owners — and absolutely nobody else. It doesn’t lower parents’ fees. Its value is almost immediately swallowed up when owners raise their fees (and then raise them again). It doesn’t improve wages for hard-working educators. It doesn’t build new child-care spaces… we must not let a small group of owners put their private interests ahead of those of our children, families and communities.
Tags: child care, featured, ideology, participation, privatization
Posted in Child & Family Delivery System | No Comments »
What’s behind Canada’s housing crisis? Experts break down the different factors at play
Friday, October 4th, 2024
The market is most likely to respond to the housing needs of those with strong purchasing power, leaving behind low and moderate income families whose housing needs cannot generate effective market demand. The consequence is growing housing inequality, with many low-income families trapped in precarious living conditions… De-commodifying and de-financializing housing is key. This means expanding community housing, prioritizing community-based solutions and ensuring long-term security for all.
Tags: economy, homelessness, housing, ideology, jurisdiction, privatization
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Are private health care providers breaking the law? Four doctors speak out on for-profit care in Canada
Saturday, August 10th, 2024
… the Canada Health Act, which specifies that medically necessary care pertains to care provided by a physician or in a hospital in order for provinces to receive their full Canada Health Transfer payments. The Act, which became law in 1984, is understandably silent on other health-care providers, such as nurse practitioners, or technological platforms that have emerged in the ensuing years… “… it’s absolutely horrible that people are being asked to pay for primary care especially when we see such a lack of support for physicians working in primary care through the publicly funded route.”
Tags: Health, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, privatization, standard of living
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
As for-profit health care expands across Canada, doctors are fighting back
Friday, August 2nd, 2024
… the Canadian Medical Association is calling on governments across the country to ensure medically necessary care is based on need and not on the ability to pay. This includes enforcing a provision in the Canada Health Act that bans making patients pay fees as a condition of receiving publicly insured health services, a practice employed by some private medical clinics.
Tags: Health, ideology, participation, privatization
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
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