The Ontario Fall Economic Outlook indicates that 59% of the Ontario health care funding increase this year comes from the annual increase in funding from the federal government via the Canada Health Transfer (CHT). The federal transfer increase accounts for $752 million out of a total provincial health care increase
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Defending Public Healthcare: Ontario has highest private health care spending in Canada
Ontario has the highest private sector health care expenditure in the country, according to data in a recent report from the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI). Total public sector expenditure in Ontario in 2013 is forecasted at only 67.7% of total health care expenditure, significantly below the Canada-wide average
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Physician numbers up 18% in four years
There has been a sharp increase in the number of physicians in Ontario and an even sharper increase in payments to physicians. Between 2008 and 2012 the number of physicians in Ontario has increased 18.5%. This growth is offset by population growth only very modestly: the number of physicians per
Continue readingIlluminated By Street Lamps: Liberty: Revealing J.S. Mill As A Visionary And J.J Rousseau As A Totalitarian
By Joe Fantauzzi @jjfantauzzi At the core of many modern democracies is the concept of freedom. Variations of the word “free” appear 27 times in the text of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms.[1] “Liberty” appears in the preamble of the Constitution of the United States.[2] But the nature of
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Physiotherapy: One more privatization scandal?
Lurking only slightly below the surface in the recent fight over changes to funding for physiotherapy is yet another problem with health care privatization. The government is stopping the ability of 94 physiotherapy clinics to directly bill OHIP. Ontario Health Minister Deb Matthews says that, over the years, licences to
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: With 34,000 jobs destroyed, Ontario focuses on Jobs and Growth
With the release of the 2013-14 first quarter finances report, Ontario Finance Minister Charles Sousa has announced the start of his own consultations on the economy. The focus (allegedly) is on “jobs and growth” . The formal pre-budget consultations with a committee of the legislature usually start in the late
Continue readingIlluminated By Street Lamps: In Brampton, Few Recorded Development Votes After Developers Contribute To Political War Chests
By Joe Fantauzzi@jjfantauzzi Key Findings: – The development industry is clearly engaged in the political process at Brampton City Hall. – 233 development companies and development-affiliated individuals were publicly disclosed to have contributed money to Brampton candidates in the 2010 municipal election. – Of those 233 developer donors, 48 were
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Ontario: 6.1 fewer hours of care per hospital patient
The real costs for the average hospital acute care patient are declining. As noted yesterday this is true for both Ontario and Canada, based on data just released from the Canadian Institute for Health Information. But the CIHI data also revealed other interesting trends, likely related. Administrative Costs Decline: Administrative costs continue their long
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Costs of hospital treatment falling
Ontario has the lowest hospital cost per weighted case of all the provinces. And the cost difference between Ontario and the rest of the country is growing. Hospital Cost Per Weighted Case ($) 2009-2010 2010-2011 2011-2012 Newfoundland 6,001 6,283 6,332 PEI DQ DQ 5,257 Nova Scotia 4,998 5,403 5,384 New
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Non-ambulance corporations to take over more EMS work?
The Minister of Health and LTC has strongly endorsed the restructuring of patient transfer industry in the South West LHIN. This may set a new model for the private corporations that often move patients between health care facilities in vehicles that look, for all the world, like ambulances — but
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Doctors get lion’s share of Budget funding
Forget all the government Budget rhetoric about better home care. The real winners are the docs. The Ontario Budget Estimates are out and the line item primarily covering the doctors (“Ontario Health Insurance”) is going up 2.9 per cent to $13.3 billion. The rest of the health care sector got
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Government: "collective bargaining is achieving results & protecting services"
Yesterday I noted that the Liberal Budget plainly states that they are planning many more years of austerity. So how does it see collective bargaining with public employees? And, moreover, public sector pensions? Collective Bargaining: The government claims that provincial public sector agreements are much lower than other sectors
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Health care spending continues decline
Contrary to the hysteria from conservatives, health care spending continues to decline as a percentage of the provincial budget. Last year, health care accounted for 38.5% of total expenditures, this year the government plans to bring it down to 38.3%. This continues the trend downwards since 2003/4 when health care
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Ontario Finance Minister plans cuts in public services
The Ontario government just lopped another $2.1 billion off their 2012-13 deficit estimate, cutting it from $11.9 billion (as of January) to $9.8 billion. This means that since 2010 when they started their public sector austerity drive, they have now cut their deficit estimates by $18.1 billion. Deficit (in billions
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Public sector wages lag private sector
Conservatives often suggest that public sector settlements are out of whack with private sector settlements. In fact, the evidence from Ontario over the last couple of decades proves the opposite. Public sector settlements have fallen behind private sector settlements. Here is the data from the Ontario Ministry of Labour: Percent
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Public sector wages lag private sector
Conservatives often suggest that public sector settlements are out of whack with private sector settlements. In fact, the evidence from Ontario over the last couple of decades proves the opposite. Public sector settlements have fallen behind private sector settlements. Here is the data from the Ontario Ministry of Labour: Percent
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Chemo fiasco – – the real perils of secrecy
Martin Regg Cohn, Queen’s Park columnist for the Toronto Star, expressed his outrage at some length today over the College of Pharmacists not answering media questions quickly enough about the diluted chemotherapy drug scandal. But he says nothing of the response from the private corporation that actually mixed the chemotherapy
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Too many public sector workers in Ontario?
Opponents of public services often try to portray the public sector as having grown disproportionately. In fact, since 1976, the size of the number of public sector employees has not kept pace with the population. In 1976, the number of public sector employees in Ontario as reported by Statistics Canada averaged
Continue readingDefending Public Healthcare: Less nursing, more medical errors
Recent Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) data indicates that Ontario has a relatively high number of “nursing-sensitive adverse events” compared to other provinces. An “adverse event” (or “medical error”) occurs when something happens in the hospital that hurts rather than helps a patient. Over the last three reported years (ending
Continue readingIlluminated By Street Lamps: Canadian lobbyists. Who They Are and What They Do.
When the federal Lobbying Act came into force in 2008, Vic Toews, then the President of the Treasury Board, declared the legislation “increased accountability in Ottawa” and provided “a more open and transparent government for all Canadians.”[1] The law, Mr. Toews added, would give Canadians more information about who is
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