On June 17, 2025, the Ontario Health Coalition held a press conference to announce they have filed formal complaints on behalf of 50 patients who were charged user fees at private clinics. The press conference can be watched here. Open letters have been released to Sylvia Jones, the provincial Minister of Health and to Marjorie Michel, Federal Health Minister to call on the Ford government to reimburse the patients and take action to stop the private clinics, along with Petitions to the House of Commons, the Prime Minister & the Minister of Health. The federal government must take all action possible to enforce the Canada Health Act in Ontario where the Ford government is violating it.
Read Ontario Health Coalition’s press release regarding this matter below:
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A printable version of this press release is on OHC’s website here.
Patient Advocates File Formal Complaints from 50 Patients,
Call for Urgent Action to Stop Illegal Fees in Private Clinics
Toronto – The Ontario Health Coalition was joined by patients from across Ontario in a press conference today as they announced that they have filed formal complaints on behalf of patients charged user fees for health care at private clinics. When the Ford government redirected resources away from public hospitals to expand private for-profit clinics the premier said, “No Ontarian will ever have to pay with a credit card. They will pay with their OHIP card.”
In direct contradiction of that promise, the Coalition has gathered evidence — including proof of payment and patient reports — from fifty patients that are included in the formal complaint. The Coalition has received more than 200 complaints over the last year. These represent only a small fraction of the number of patients who are facing charges of hundreds to thousands of dollars when they go for cataract surgery in the private clinics.
Under the Canada Health Act, patients are supposed to be protected against user charges and extra-billing for medically needed surgeries, diagnostic tests and physician services. Selling queue jumping is not allowed. Patients are to have access to health care based on their medical need, not how wealthy they are. The federal government is to uphold the Act and require provinces to abide by it in order to receive full federal funding for health care. Under Ontario’s laws, it is an offense for any person or entity to charge a patient for an OHIP covered service. No one can make access to needed care contingent on paying for medically unneeded things. Patients have the right to informed consent. Extra-billing, user fees, selling queue-jumping and manipulating patients into paying user fees are not allowed.
The Coalition wants patients to know that everything they need for cataract surgery is covered under OHIP, including eye measurement tests, lenses that are unique to their eye, and eye drops, appointments with physicians and follow up. Cataract surgery generally has very good outcomes. No one can charge a patient for cataract surgery, or the medically needed eye exams and eye drops associated with the surgery. Often patients end up paying for things that are not part of cataract surgery. Often patients are lied to about wait times in order to convince them to pay. Ontario has a wait times website that tracks the actual wait times for every part of the province. Most patients with urgent medical need are getting their cataract surgery within three-and-a-half months and those without urgent medical need are getting their surgery within seven months.
The Coalition outlined the types of complaints that they have received in two separate open letters to Sylvia Jones, Ontario’s Minister of Health and to Marjorie Michel, Federal Health Minister. They called on the Ford government to reimburse the patients and take action to stop the private clinics. They asked the federal government to take all action possible to enforce the Canada Health Act in Ontario where the Ford government is violating it.
Quotes:
“Without question, patients – many of whom are elderly and on fixed incomes – are being exploited. They are being charged hundreds or even thousands of dollars, particularly when they go to private clinics for cataract surgeries,” said Natalie Mehra, executive director of the Ontario Health Coalition. “Patients are using up their entire savings, their grocery money, and some have even had to go back to work long after retirement, in order to pay for their surgeries. This should never happen in Canada. We are demanding that the provincial government finally take action to stop the private clinics and that the federal government enforce the Canada Health Act in Ontario where the Ford government is violating it.”
Maureen Munro from London was informed that she had macular degeneration and needed eye surgery urgently or she would lose her vision. She was told that she would have to pay or face two year wait lists (which was not true). She said, “I was informed the cost to receive the surgery would be almost $7,000. Being as I live alone, I did not want to have macular degeneration, nor lose my quality of life. Therefore, I paid the $7,000 in 2022. Being a senior on a fixed income, I am still trying to catch up with bills from this surgery.”
David Kauk from Kitchener-Waterloo was charged $250 for eye measurement tests and then a week before the surgery, the surgeon told him he would have to pay $1,100 per eye. He refused to pay and had to go elsewhere. He said, “I feel that I was misled throughout the process and was kept in the dark until the final minute.”
Diana Ralph from Ottawa was told that the OHIP-covered cataract surgery was “old fashioned” and was charged $400 for the diagnostic exam. The clinic tried to charge her $1,300 for the surgery but she did not pay and went elsewhere. She said, “I felt offended by the dishonest and manipulative hard-sell and chose to not get the surgery at that private clinic.”
Jules Tupker and his wife from Thunder Bay were each charged $225 (for a total of $550) for eye measurements when they went in to a private clinic. He said, “I contacted the Ministry of Health to make a complaint. That was after my surgery in October. I never heard back from them.”
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Open Letters to the Ontario Minister of Health and the Federal Minister of Health
Here is the open letter to Ontario’s Health Minister, Sylvia Jones.
Here is the open letter to the federal Health Minister, Marjorie Michel.
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Petition
This is the wording of the petition for your information. You cannot send it in by email. We have attached it in English and French (in vertical and horizontal versions — please use whatever works for you). Please print off the petition that you want to use, sign it and fill in the required information (and get others to sign it also!) and mail it in. Our address is at the bottom of the petition. There is no deadline at this point. We will be collecting petitions all summer and submit them in the fall.
The petitions are attached and also on our website here.
Petition to the House of Commons, Prime Minister & Minister of Health
We, the undersigned citizens and residents of Canada, draw the attention of the House of Commons to the following:
WHEREAS:
Ontario’s Doug Ford government has redirected thousands of surgeries from public hospitals to private, for-profit clinics and hospitals, and;
The private MRI/CT and cataract surgery clinics are extra-billing patients, charging user fees, and manipulating patients — particularly elderly patients — into paying thousands of dollars when they go in for care, and;
Patients are reporting exorbitant charges of $4,000, $8,000, even up to $11,000 for cataract surgery in Ontario’s private clinics, as well as hundreds of dollars for access to primary care in private for-profit nurse practitioner clinics, and;
The Canada Health Act bans user fees and extra-billing of patients & requires that our medical care be funded by taxes (OHIP) and provided without financial barriers, based on Canadians’ medical need not how much money a person has, and;
No patient should be forced or manipulated into paying for their cataract and other surgeries, MRIs and CTs, and primary care – in fact these charges are just what the Canada Health Act was set up to prevent, therefore:
We, the undersigned, call on the Government of Canada to uphold and enforce the Canada Health Act and take all possible measures to stop the Ford government from violating it.
Pétition adressée à la Chambre des Communes, au Premier Ministre et au Ministre de la Santé
Nous, citoyens et résidents du Canada, soussignés, attirons l’attention de la Chambre des Communes sur ce qui suit :
ATTENDU QUE:
Le gouvernement de Doug Ford, en Ontario, a transféré des milliers d’opérations chirurgicales des hôpitaux publics vers des cliniques et des hôpitaux privés à but lucratif, et que;
Les cliniques privées d’IRM/CT et de chirurgie de la cataracte facturent des frais supplémentaires aux patients, leur imposent des frais d’utilisation et les incitent, en particulier les personnes âgées, à payer des milliers de dollars lorsqu’ils se rendent à un rendez-vous médical, et que;
Les patients signalent des frais exorbitants de 4 000 $, 8 000 $, voire jusqu’à 11 000 $ pour une opération de la cataracte dans des cliniques privées de l’Ontario, ainsi que des centaines de dollars pour accéder aux soins primaires dans des cliniques privées à but lucratif dirigées par des infirmières praticiennes, et que;
La Loi Canadienne sur la Santé interdit les frais d’utilisation et la surfacturation des patients et exige que nos soins médicaux soient financés par les impôts (OHIP) et fournis sans obstacle financier, en fonction des besoins médicaux des Canadiens et non de leur situation financière, et que:
Aucun patient ne devrait être contraint ou manipulé pour payer ses opérations de la cataracte ou d’autres interventions chirurgicales, ses IRM et ses tomodensitométries, ni ses soins primaires. En effet, ces frais sont précisément ce que la Loi Canadienne sur la Santé vise à empêcher, par conséquent :
Nous, les soussignés, demandons au gouvernement du Canada de respecter et d’appliquer la Loi Canadienne sur la Santé et de prendre toutes les mesures possibles pour empêcher le gouvernement Ford de la violer.
