No respite for Ontario patients: new report says five times more hospital beds needed than planned by Ford government

New analysis shows Ontario needs 16,800 additional hospital beds by 2032 but only 3,000 have been planned by the Ontario PCs even as hallway healthcare reaches record high

PERTH, ON –(COMMUNITYWIRE)– Ontario’s hospital capacity crisis will worsen in the coming years as the province needs five times as many staffed beds as planned by the Ford government, according to a new research report released by CUPE’s Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU/CUPE) in Perth today.

Citing latest data on hospital funding, bed capacity, staffing levels, admission times, and other metrics, the report shows declining levels of service and warns that the “worst is yet to come.”

“The data paints a dire picture. There is a massive gap between what Ontarians need and what this government plans to do,” said Michael Hurley, president of OCHU/CUPE. “People are already paying the consequences for the Ontario PC policy of scarcity and it’s only going to get worse: we’ll see longer wait-times, more patients on stretchers in hallways, and fewer staff to provide care.”

The report notes that these challenges are driven by underfunding. According to the union, just to maintain current levels of service, Ontario must increase annual hospital funding by $2 billion. The Perth and Smith Falls District Hospital – which had a $2.4 million deficit in 2023/24 – requires $4.31 million.

According to OCHU/CUPE, the Perth and Smith Falls area requires 140 additional staff and 20 beds over the next 10 years just to maintain existing levels of service – which wasn’t solve the capacity crisis.

Most patients in the region admitted to the Perth and Smith Falls District Hospital via the emergency room faced long wait-times in July 2024: only 35 per cent were admitted within the target-time of eight hours at the Perth site, and less than half in Smith Falls.

“Has the government given up on the hospital crisis?”

The union says that based on the government’s own plans, there is a looming capacity shortfall of 13,800 hospital beds by 2032.

Accounting for multiple factors including population growth (which accounts for half of Ontario’s economic growth) and population aging, the report estimates that Ontario needs about 16,800 additional hospital beds by 2032. However, as repeatedly stated by health minister Sylvia Jones, the government plans to increase capacity by just 3,000 beds – or one-fifth of what is required based on OCHU/CUPE’s estimates.

A recent report by the news outlet The Trillium revealed that Ontario’s hallway health care problem is worse than ever, with an average of 2,000 patients a day receiving care in makeshift spaces due

to lack of beds and staff, representing a 100 per cent increase since Doug Ford was first elected in 2018.

“In 2018, Ford said he would end hallway healthcare. In 2024, he’s joking about veterinary hospitals handling overflow,” said Hurley. “It begs the question: has this government given up on the hospital crisis? What is their plan to address the suffering of people due to the state of our under-resourced hospitals?”

Ontario currently has 2.23 hospital beds per 1,000 people, which is marginally lower than the 2.25 beds it had just prior to COVID in 2019. “The hospital capacity crisis is also compounded by a lack of new long-term care beds,” notes the report, with a 20 per cent increase in the waitlist since the Ontario PCs came to power in 2018.

Rising vacancies and looming staff shortages

Vacancies continue to rise in the hospital sector as 22,330 jobs remain unfilled across the province. The number of vacancies has grown 17 per cent over the past year, and 534 per cent since 2015.

Hurley noted that an internal government document (which it tried to keep secret) from May this year showed a looming shortage of more than 80,000 nurses and personal support workers by 2032, with no plan to recruit or retain workers.

He said that instead of taking requisite measures, the government has been “releasing misinformation” about adding staff.

Government officials have been saying the province has “added 30,000 nurses” in the past two years, but Hurley pointed out that figure simply looks at new registrants without accounting for nurses who have deregistered or have stopped practicing. Citing the latest College of Nurses data from August 2024, Hurley said the number of practicing nurses has only increased by 11,263.

“The government is cherry-picking data,” he said. “The most relevant metric here is the number of nurses practicing in the field, and that isn’t keeping pace with patient needs. The reality is the government is doing nothing to retain staff, who are increasingly demoralized in the face of ongoing cutbacks.”

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For more information, contact:

Zaid Noorsumar, CUPE Communications
znoorsumar@cupe.ca
647-995-9859