Emergency departments are closing across the country. Wait times in those open frequently surpass 20 hours. An unprecedented number of people are being cared for in hallways and spaces not designed for care, as they wait for specialists or procedures. Frail elders are waiting months in loud and uncomfortable hospital rooms for a long-term care spot. About one in five Canadians are without a family doctor.
It’s not a lack of hospital beds or buildings that’s driving this crisis. Our health-care systems are collapsing because there aren’t enough people willing to work in them. As Prince Edward Island Health Minister Mark McLane said last fall, when Canada’s provincial health ministers gathered in Charlottetown, the top three issues facing our health systems “are staffing, staffing and staffing.” The number of vacant health-care positions are now almost 92,000, up from about 22,500 in 2015, according to Statistics Canada.
Pay is a major factor explaining why people are leaving health-care jobs or choosing not to enter the professions in the first place. Doug Allan, a health researcher with the Canadian Union of Public Employees in Ontario, says the gap between salaries for health-care jobs versus non-health-care jobs has shrunk in the last decade. Statistics Canada data shows that in 2015, the average hourly wage of people working in Canadian hospitals was 51 per cent above the all-industry average, which includes well-paid office jobs but is weighed down by low-paid and non-unionized service-sector jobs. In 2023, hospital wages were just 19 per cent above that all-industry average in Ontario. This shrinking gap demonstrates “there are more opportunities in other (non-health care) industries that are more attractive,” says Allan. “We have people in this sector rethinking their career choices.”
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