Ontario Budget: Summary of Health Care Investments

The 2013 Ontario Budget,  titled “A Prosperous and Fair Ontario”, was released yesterday, May 2, 2013. Investments in and improvements to our health care system are mentioned throughout. Here are some of the highlights:

• investing $3.5 billion in capital grants to hospitals over 3 years to support 19 major hospital projects that are under construction and more than 30 that are in various stages of planning
• investing to reduce home care wait times for nursing services and improve personal support services for clients with complex care needs
• providing an additional one per cent per year to increase overall funding for home and community care services by an average of over five per cent annually over the next 3 years
• investing in more health care services in the community, including over $700 million by 2015–16, to continue to reduce wait times for home care and provide the people of Ontario with more options that are available closer to home
• investing in those who need care the most by creating 23 community Health Links across Ontario that will foster collaboration and coordination among a patient’s health care providers
• launching Ontario’s Action Plan for Seniors to provide better access to health care, quality resources, and improved safety and security for Ontario’s seniors. This includes new supports for long‐term care homes and matching a primary care provider with every Ontario senior who wants one
• moving forward with the Comprehensive Mental Health and Addictions Strategy, focused to date on children and youth, with funding growing to $93 million per year by 2013–14
• working with First Nation communities to increase access to care and community supports for those addicted to prescription narcotics
• investing over $42 million per year in additional funding to help families and adults in urgent need, reduce waitlist pressures and better support those with complex needs
• working with community partners to promote RDSPs and encourage ODSP recipients and other people with disabilities to establish RDSPs
• asking the Law Commission of Ontario to review how adults with developmental or mental disabilities might be better enabled to participate in RSDPs