Details were announced today by Jill Dunlop, Minister of Colleges and Universities and Prabmeet Sarkaria, President of the Treasury Board.
“Ontario’s health care professionals are some of the finest practitioners in the world and that is a testament to the education they receive through Ontario’s universities and colleges,” said Minister Dunlop. “This expansion will increase access to family and specialty physicians and other health care professionals in every corner of the province to ensure that Ontarians can access the health care they need, when they need it, wherever they may live.”
NOSM, established in 2005, educates health care professionals to practise in Indigenous, Francophone, rural, remote and underserved communities. At present, there are 64 undergraduate medical education seats and 60 postgraduate positions. NOSM University will receive 30 additional undergraduate seats by 2026 and 41 additional postgraduate positions by 2027.
“As our government continues to make record investments to build up our health care infrastructure, we’re ensuring that we have the trained professionals needed to care for a growing Ontario,” said Prabmeet Sarkaria, President of the Treasury Board. “After years of chronic staffing shortages, budget cuts, and neglect from previous governments, we’re expanding medical school spaces across Ontario, and giving the eager students of today the opportunity to become the skilled doctors serving our communities tomorrow.”
Ontario’s medical school expansion is part of the government’s A Plan to Stay Open, a comprehensive package of legislative amendments that would increase capacity in the health care system and strengthen the government’s ability to respond to future emergencies. Ontario is adding 160 undergraduate seats and 295 postgraduate positions over the next five years, the largest expansion of undergraduate and postgraduate medical education in over 10 years.
“Training more doctors in northern Ontario is a critical part of our plan to build a better, more resilient health care system for communities in the North,” said Christine Elliott, Deputy Premier and Minister of Health. “We are building up the health care system by providing opportunities for our doctors of tomorrow to join our health care workforce to support the care needs of Ontarians for years to come.”