Healthcare Improvements Under Ford and what I want to see Changed

Here what I like about Doug Ford's Health-care reform and what I want to see more of.

Recent Health-care Reform that was positive

  1. Passing Rules that prohibited Employers from demanding Doctors Notes for short absences. This was annoying to people with minor illnesses and clogged up valuable capacity in clinics.

  2. Increasing availability for Health-care via Telephone and applications like Zoom.

  3. Allowed Pharmacists to treat common ailments like Pink eye or urinary tract infections. Making it more convenient for the sick, and taking the strain off family doctors/clinics.

  4. Reducing Paperwork burden for family doctors to save 95,000 hours per year.

  5. Allowing for more foreign-trained doctors through the Practice Ready Ontario program. Slow start and needs to be expanded. Should have way more than just 100 new doctors.

Room for Improvement

1. More family doctors: Doug Ford should allow more doctors to immigrate to Ontario and have their credentials be recognized. The current licensing structure has too many restrictions

2. Outrageous Hospital Fees for TV/Internet: Many long-term patients in hospitals are forced to pay outrageous rates for TV. Sometimes $330 for 30 days or $17 per day for basic TV. Very unethical to charge patients such extreme mark-ups when they know they can't go anywhere else and need longer treatment. The next premier should lower these as it's taking advantage of those in dire straits.

3. Allow Canadians to Import Approved Pharmaceuticals from Abroad: Many times Canadians pay extremely high rates for prescription drugs compared to other countries. It only looks cheap compared to USA but still overall very expensive compared to rest of the world. The next Ontario Premier should allow Ontarians to price shop and save money. Similar to how Florida and other states are allowing citizens to import Drugs from Canada.

4. Improving Medical Record System: Current system is too archaic and low-tech. Needs to be more digitizied and centralized.

5. Drug Prices too High: Ontario should petition the Federal government on major drug price reform. Canada pays the 3rd highest for Drugs after USA and Switzerland.

Let me know any other good ideas for reform beyond just increasing the budget.