In our ongoing efforts to prioritize the well-being of those in Ontario, I am excited to share the latest initiatives aimed at improving healthcare and education in our province. We are dedicated to enhancing medical services, ensuring accessibility, and improving education.
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Our government is working hard to deliver on items that matter to Ontarians. In this edition of the Weekly Update, you can find the latest news on what the Province is doing to:
- Reduce Wait Times for Surgeries and Diagnostic Procedures
- Bring Back-to-Basics Kindergarten Curriculum to our Public Educaton
- Make It Easier for Youth in Toronto to Connect to Mental Health Services
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Ontario Taking Next Steps in Plan to Further Reduce Wait Times for Surgeries and Diagnostic Procedures
As part of the next steps to implement Your Health, a plan for connected and convenient care, the Ontario government is proposing regulatory changes that, would name Accreditation Canada as the inspection body responsible for ensuring the highest quality standards and strong oversight of the 900+ current and all future community surgical and diagnostic centres, effective April 1, 2024.
Given its national leadership role in this type of work for over 65 years, Accreditation Canada has been chosen to develop an enhanced oversight and quality assurance program for current and future community surgical and diagnostic centres that will have the same strong requirements as public hospitals in order to improve quality standards at facilities and ensure consistent patient safety and quality health care. Over the coming weeks, the province will consult extensively with health care sector partners, regulatory colleges representing providers, and patients and families on the development of the new oversight and quality assurance program.
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Beginning in Spring 2024, the government will also take the next step in expanding the number of community surgical and diagnostic centres licensed in the province to deliver additional OHIP insured services to people closer to home, including more MRI/CT scans, GI endoscopies, and orthopedic surgeries.
Through the actions taken to date as part of Your Health, Ontario is connecting more people to surgeries and diagnostics care and reducing wait times. Progress over the past year includes:
- Achieving the shortest surgical wait times of any province in Canada in 2023, with nearly 80 per cent of people receiving their procedure within clinically recommended target times;
- Reducing the surgical waitlist since its peak in March 2022, resulting in 16,000 fewer people waiting for the surgeries they need;
- Eliminating the backlog of cervical cancer screening tests at the end of August 2023. Testing turnaround times returned to the pre-pandemic standard of 10 to 14 days;
- Completion rates of pediatric surgeries are reaching 112 per cent of pre-pandemic levels, as of December 2023; and
- Increasing diagnostic imaging capacity by an additional 97,767 MRI and 116,443 CT operating hours.
As Ontario continues to make progress implementing Your Health, the government will continue making bold, innovative and creative changes to make it faster and easier for people to conveniently connect to care closer to home.
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Ontario Unveils a Back-to-Basics Kindergarten Curriculum
The Ontario government is taking continued action to emphasize back-to-basics learning by introducing mandatory learning through clear and direct instruction in reading, writing and math for kindergarten students. Combined with hands-on and play-based learning, this new kindergarten curriculum will ensure students entering Grade 1 across the province have the foundational skills in literacy and math and intellectual growth that will help set them up for long-term success.
All students will soon benefit from evidence-based clear and direct instruction in literacy for the first time to build their vocabulary and instil a passion for reading and writing. New and mandatory learning will include the understanding of sound-letter relationships, developing phonics knowledge and using specific vocabulary. For example, as children are constructing a house with building blocks and other materials, the educator would intentionally use new words to build student vocabulary.
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New learning expectations are also being added to the kindergarten curriculum. In math, clear and direct instruction in foundational numeracy skills will be provided to all students in addition to daily opportunities to explore math concepts through regular classroom activities. All students will start to learn about fractions, coding and patterns earlier in their education. These new lessons will build foundational math concepts and skills that are the gateway to the disciplines of science, technology and engineering, as well as construction, skilled trades and architecture.
Currently, kindergarten students learn from a “program” that was developed eight years ago. To elevate this learning and ensure the curriculum prepares all students for success, Ontario is advancing consistency and enhanced academic rigour for students. The driving force for this reform and focus on boosting literacy is recommended by the 2022 Ontario Human Rights Commission Right to Read inquiry report, which identified that Ontario’s kindergarten program was failing to teach many students to read and promote reading confidence.
- In September 2023, the Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) released its annual student assessment results that demonstrate encouraging progress in student outcomes.
- In April 2023, Ontario Launches Plan to Boost Math, Writing and Reading Skills which invested more than $180 million in targeted supports in the classroom and at home to help students build the math and reading skills and knowledge they need to succeed in the workforce.
- Early reading intervention is part of the province’s response to the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s (OHRC) Right to Read Report. As such, the province is focused on modernizing the way reading is taught and assessed in schools to help improve student literacy.
- To further support students in the development of early reading skills, the province is investing $65 million over the coming years to support reading intervention. An additional investment of $12.5 million will be directed toward procuring licenses for a ministry-approved, evidence-based early reading screening tool for use in Year 2 of kindergarten to Grade 2.
The changes and supports, which will be in place starting in September 2025, are the next step in Ontario’s plan to modernize the curriculum and ensure every student has the skills to succeed in the classroom and prepare them for whatever path they choose.
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Ontario Making It Easier for Youth in West Toronto to Connect to Mental Health Services
The Ontario government is making it faster and easier for young people to connect to mental health and substance use support with the official launch of a new Youth Wellness Hub to serve the west-end of Toronto and surrounding areas. The new West Toronto Youth Wellness Hub is the eighth hub to open across the province in the past year. Since 2020, Ontario has launched 22 hubs, helping connect over 43,000 youth and their families to mental health and wellness services, accounting for over 168,000 visits. Based on the success of Ontario’s Youth Wellness Hubs, the province will be opening an additional five hubs to connect more communities to youth mental health services, close to home, bringing the total number of hubs to 27.
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In West Toronto, youth aged 12 to 25 and their families can visit the hub to connect to convenient and free mental health, substance use and primary care services in a safe, youth-friendly space. Services are as diverse as the youth who use them and focus on culturally appropriate and trauma-informed care. There are also supports to help connect and support youth with more specialized and intensive care needs, such as safe beds for detox. Young people can drop in for counselling or peer support, book an appointment or access services virtually. Through the actions taken to date as part of Your Health, Ontario is connecting more people to mental health services and reducing wait times. Progress over the past year includes:
- Expanding the Ontario Structured Psychotherapy (OSP) program to connect adults who have depression, anxiety and anxiety-related concerns to free cognitive behavioural therapy and other related services through ten network lead organizations with over 100 service delivery sites across the province. To date, over 75,600 people have enrolled in the OSP program.
- Opening over 400 addiction treatment beds since 2019.
- Providing children and youth with complex mental health needs with secure treatment by opening 16 additional treatment beds since 2021 with 12 new treatment beds slated to open soon, once the new Roberts Smart Centre youth facility is completed.
- Making it more convenient for children to access mental health supports through One Stop Talk/Parlons maintenant which, as of December 31, 2023, has provided immediate, virtual mental health counselling to 1,264 children and youth.
- Helping people access mental health supports through Health811, Ontario’s free, secure and confidential health advice line.
- Investing nearly $33 million in 2022-23 into over 100 mental health and addictions supports and programs designed to meet the needs of Indigenous communities across the province.
With Your Health: A Plan for Connected and Convenient Care, the government has significantly expanded the number of Youth Wellness Hub across the province to make it faster and easier for young people to connect to mental health and substance use support, primary care, social services, and more.
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My constituency office is open Monday to Friday from 10AM to 4PM.
If you have any questions or concerns we’re readily available to assist you.
You can also reach us by phone at (416) 781-2395
or by email at robin.martin@pc.ola.org.
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Warmest Wishes,
 Robin Martin, MPP
Eglinton-Lawrence
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