The Ford government says it is making good progress on its plan to connect every Ontarian with some form of primary care, although roughly two million are still unattached.
On the eve of last year’s snap election, Health Minister Sylvia Jones launched a plan to spend $1.8 billion on primary care — rolling out more physicians, nurse practitioners and multidisciplinary teams.
The policy pledged to connect everyone in the province with a primary care provider by 2029 and is being spearheaded by former federal Liberal cabinet minister Jane Philpott. It was announced the day before an election that the Ontario Liberals fought under the banner of access to health care.
A year later, the Progressive Conservatives say they’re making progress and are on course to hit their goal.
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Over four years, the strategy promised to connect hundreds of thousands to primary care. The targets were:
- 2025/26: 300,000
- 2026/27: 500,000
- 2027/28: 500,000
- 2028/29: 600,000
As of September, the government said it had already added 275,000 new people to primary care. Officials said they were confident that, with so many already signed up, they would reach their target of 300,000 for the first year.
The new strategy intends to fund 300 new and expanded interprofessional primary health-care teams, which will be used to supplement physicians to offer primary care to the two million people who, as of January 2026, still do not have access.
In June 2025, the government approved 75 proposals representing 135 primary care teams for the first phase of the plan. They included teams in Thunder Bay, Sault Ste. Marie and the Region of Peel.
Officials said the goal was to attach everyone in the province with a primary health team, admitting the way in which different groups attach their patients differs. Nurse practitioner clinics, community health clinics, family health teams and physician-only clinics all have slightly different methods to sign patients up, they said.
Recently, Ontario’s auditor general cautioned that attaching someone to a primary care clinic doesn’t guarantee they’ll receive timely care.
“Attachment refers to a documented and confirmed connection between a patient and a regular primary care provider; access refers to the ability to see a provider when needed,” the auditor wrote.
Elsewhere, the government said it is close to clearing a massive backlog of patients who have been waiting to be paired with a primary care professional through its Health Care Connect portal.
The waitlist sat at around 234,500 in January 2025, according to the province. Officials said it would be cleared by September.
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