A healthy economy depends on a healthy population. As Ontario rebuilds its health-care system from COVID-19, it needs a highly skilled health-care workforce and ground-breaking innovation to address increasingly complex challenges, such as the long-term impacts of the pandemic, the needs of an aging population, as well as a backlog of elective surgeries and routine procedures.
Amid the challenges brought on by COVID-19, Ontario’s universities are helping Ontario rebuild its health-care system by meeting the need for a strong health-care workforce, creating Ontario-made innovations and advancing health-focused research.
Universities graduate more than 10,000 students from health-care programs. They have the ability to educate and train greater numbers of doctors, nurses, nurse practitioners and other health professionals and managers needed to navigate COVID-19 and beyond in order to reduce the growing burden placed on our province’s health-care system.
University researchers are also conducting ground-breaking research in health care that has led to vaccine development, treatments and outcomes modeling, supporting the fight against COVID-19.
There is strong demand in the health-care programs universities offer and record-high applications to these programs. This highly skilled, in-demand talent is ready to meet the need today and into the future, ensuring Ontario’s patients receive critical care.
It is why in order to fully unleash this potential, Ontario’s universities are asking that the government — through increases to university revenue sources, such as expanding spaces in high-demand programs to ensure a strong health-care workforce — make critical investments in the sector today to rebuild a better Ontario for tomorrow.
In Partnering to Drive Ontario’s Recovery through Talent and Innovation, we outline how, as Ontario looks to rebuild and recover from COVID-19, Ontario’s universities are at the forefront of rebuilding a world-class health-care system; developing job-ready graduates; driving regional economic development; and creating solutions to Ontario’s challenges.
Browse through reports and related materials to find out about Ontario universities' role in everything ranging from university graduate employment to family medicine and community transformation.