Ontario making new investments in Lakeridge Health and Whitby’s Ontario Shores

Lakeridge Health and Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health will share nearly $15 million in provincial funding this fiscal year, part of a Queen’s Park promise to invest an additional $827 in hospitals across Ontario.

Lakeridge Health will receive the bulk of the new Durham funding – $12.3 million – while Ontario Shores will receive $2.8 million. The funding represents increases of 2.6 per cent and two per cent, respectively, from the previous year.

Ontario Finance Minister Peter Bethlenfalvy, who is also the MPP for Pickering-Uxbridge, said the new money will ensure all publicly funded hospitals receive a minimum two per cent increase to their operating budgets to help them better meet patient needs, while building a stronger, more resilient health care system.

“As part of our Plan to Stay Open, our government is continuing to build a stronger health care system for Ontarians,” Bethlenfalvy said. “This funding will ensure hospitals in Durham Region can continue to provide excellent care for patients and families.”

Over the last four years, the Ontario government has made significant investments in Ontario’s hospitals as part of its plan to build a more resilient health care system that is better able to respond to crisis, he added. This includes overall sector increases four years in a row, representing a total provincial investment of $2.5 billion since 2019.

Health Minister Christine Elliot, a former MPP for Whitby, said Ontario hospitals have been “unwavering” in their commitment to protect the health and wellbeing of Ontarians. “Our government is committed to ensuring that they have the resources needed to recover from the pandemic and meet the ongoing needs of the communities they serve.”

“By increasing investments in hospitals provincewide,” she added, “our government is helping to ensure that patients have access to the high-quality care they need, when and where they need it.”

The government is also investing $15.2 million to add 88 new patient beds to Lakeridge Health, part of a capital plan expansion with more than 50 major projects that will add 3,000 new beds over 10 years and support the continuation of more than 3,100 acute and post-acute beds in hospitals and alternate health care facilities, and hundreds of new adult, paediatric and neo-natal critical care beds. Since the outset of the pandemic, the government has added 777 more intensive-care unit hospital beds with the capacity to now handle 2,448 critical care patients.

Both Karim Mamdani, Ontario Shore’s CEO, and Lakeridge Health CEO Cynthia Davis were “appreciative” of the new funding from the Province, with Davis saying the money will help the hospital organization achieve its vision of One System, Best Health, as well as ensuring Durham residents are able to continue to receive “timely access to critically needed acute care services.”