RNAO responds to 2026 provincial budget
The provincial government released its 2026 budget on March 26, which included a funding boost to $3.4 billion for primary care and $1 billion in additional funding for home care over three years.
On Windsor radio station AM800 (March 26), RNAO CEO Dr. Doris Grinspun applauded these “two very good pieces of news.” This funding will help shift health care away from hospitals and towards care in the community. “People prefer to stay at home,” she said.
A substantive portion of funds needs to go to competitive compensation for nurses in this sector, she added. “On average, nurses who work in home care make 70 per cent of what their counterparts in hospitals earn. I do hope the flexibility is there for home care agencies to use the budget to improve significantly their compensation by 30 per cent at least,” she explained.
On the issue of saving money by supporting more people in their homes, Grinspun added that investments in long-term care are tremendously important, but “…like hospitals, when it is needed.” More alternatives to help people age at home are vital.
On the boost to primary care, Grinspun said: “Dr. Jane Philpott is driving the bus in a good direction. We just need to go faster and more furiously to hire more nurse practitioners and more RNs, so more people are receiving timely access to primary care.”
RNAO’s media release noted areas where the government needs to place much more attention, including affordable housing, social assistance rates and the climate crisis.
Researchers find Black Canadians less likely to fill prescriptions due to cost
RNAO member and professor of nursing, Dr. Bukola Oladunni Salami is co-chair for RNAO’s new best practice guideline (BPG) titled Addressing Anti-Black Racism in Nursing (AABR). She is senior author on a study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal on March 23, 2026.
The Canadian Community Health Survey, conducted annually by Health Canada, found that 10 to 15 per cent of Black adults skipped medication doses or did not refill prescriptions compared to about six per cent of white adults. Even when researchers omitted variables for income and insurance, Black people were still less likely to fill prescriptions, Bukola said. A possible reason for this could include distrust of the health-care system because of direct or systematic racism.
“I think this points us to a very, very important question related to the need for equity in medication drug coverage,” she said. “When we think about Canada, we say we have universal health care – but universal health care that does not include prescriptions.” (CTV News, March 23)
Read more about RNAO’s equity work with Black nurses on the In Focus webpage. And get details on the release of the new AABR BPG in this issue’s in-depth feature about the launch event at Queen’s Park in February 2026.
Letter to the editor
RNAO President NP Lhamo Dolkar’s letter about co-payments for asylum claimants was published (Globe and Mail, March 5, 2026).
We believe the Conservative motion proposing to restrict temporary health-care coverage for asylum claimants demonizes newcomers to Canada.
Slashing so‑called deluxe benefits for (allegedly) “bogus and fraudulent” refugee claimants and deporting non‑citizens who commit crimes would not be leadership, but reckless political theatre. It would prey on fear, fuel division and distract from the real crisis: chronic underinvestment in health care and failure to support the professionals who hold the system together.
Nurses know refugees are not the cause of surgical backlogs, emergency room closures or nursing shortages. Suggesting otherwise vilifies vulnerable people who arrive in Canada seeking safety, not special treatment.
Deportation is a punitive tactic. Real safety should come from evidence‑based policy: mental health supports, housing stability and health investments, not human beings as political props.
Canadians can do better. We should refuse rhetoric that undermines compassion, justice and the inclusive values we claim to protect.
Sign RNAO’s Action Alert online.
Windsor-Essex chapter hosts event on violence against nurses
On Feb. 12, RNAO’s Windsor-Essex chapter hosted a webinar that focused on strategies to prevent violence against nurses. The event was co-hosted by RNAO’s Mental Health Nurses Interest Group and Sigma Tau Epsilon.
Chapter chair Kathy Moreland said there have always been acts of aggression in health care, but a three-fold increase in the number of workers’ compensation cases from 2012 to 2024 is concerning.
“Nurses are certainly reporting more aggression, like bringing weapons [to health-care settings],” she said. This is an issue affecting nurses in all sectors of the system, she added. “It’s not just hospitals. It happens … in clinics and long-term care settings,” Moreland explained. “Nurses shouldn’t be afraid to go to work.” (AM800, Feb. 12)
Concern about closure of supervised consumption services (SCS) sites
On March 16, the Ontario government announced it would end funding for the remaining supervised consumption services (SCS) sites in Ontario as of June 13. The move affects sites in Toronto, Ottawa, London, Kingston, Peterborough and St. Catharines.
RNAO CEO Dr. Doris Grinspun told the London Free Press (March 24) that “closing safe consumption sites will not eliminate substance use because not everybody is ready for treatment. This is an ideological move that will cost lives and will cause more unsafe communities, not less.”
The article referenced a letter to the editor (London Free Press, March 21), in which Grinspun said the move was a “callous decision that leaves vulnerable people to fend for themselves.”
Similar letters calling for the reversal of this decision were also published in the Peterborough Examiner and St. Catharines Standard. An Action Alert was also issued, urging members and non-member to make their voices heard on how this will lead to more preventable deaths.
IENs face new requirements to join workforce
In January 2026, the College of Nurses of Ontario (CNO) changed the evidence of practice requirement for internationally educated nurses (IEN) looking to join the workforce. Applicants must prove they have had nursing experience in the past three years. And experience outside of Ontario must be obtained through paid work rather than volunteer roles.
“It’s very unrealistic for us to reach this. Hopefully this is not another barrier to become a nurse in Canada,” said RN Mark Anthony Gravoso, an RNAO member and president of the Integrated Filipino Canadian Nurses Association.
While the CNO says the change is necessary because volunteer settings vary with respect to standardized documentation and oversight, Gravoso suggested the CNO could expand its eligibility criteria to ensure the patient safety experience it requires. This would give IENs hope they can overcome any hurdles to practise. (CityNews, Feb. 7)
New research project to improve long-term care staffing
St. Lawrence College nursing professors and RNAO members Dr. Andrea Rochon and Julie Dyke have been awarded a grant valued at almost $360,000 to support a three-year research program they hope changes the way future generations of nurses view careers in long-term care (LTC). “Our older adults need care,” said Dyke.
“Our scope is to change your perspective,” said Dyke. “If [students] have a positive experience with placement… they might see this as a career opportunity, and hopefully they will be retained in those long-term care homes in the long run.”
The goal is to enhance the appeal of LTC over higher paying, faster paced jobs in other sectors. “That’s the reason we want to do this study, to change that perspective…to [allow students to] see long-term care as a positive career opportunity.” (The Cornwall Standard Freeholder, Jan. 14)
Book explores knowledge sharing across generations
RNAO members Tilda Shalof and Lisa Mochrie have co-authored a book called The Handover: A Nurse’s Last Shift. The title is a play on the practice of a handover from one nurse to another on the next shift. This exchange of knowledge is a critical part of safe, effective nursing practice.
In a CBC Radio interview (Jan. 25), Mochrie, who is practising in acute care, shared that starting her nursing career during the pandemic was difficult. “There wasn’t a shift where I wasn’t coming home with marks on my face from my N95 mask or putting patients into body bags,” she recalled. She shared that she leaned on Shalof, who is retired, during that time through phone calls and letters as she found it hard to confide in others who don’t work in health care. “I was grappling with some of the things my non-health care provider friends were dealing with. But I had this additional ball that I was juggling of the traumas and the stories that the health-care system at the time.”
Shalof said that what surprised her the most during the pandemic was watching early career nurses face the turmoil head on. “I had seen crises before. I had lived through SARS,” she told CBC. “It was really shocking to see what Lisa and her cohort go through so young in their careers.”
“We’ve dedicated this book to those who stay,” Shalof said. “There’s so many reasons to leave (nursing) and yet there are many gifts you can win for yourself if you decide to stay.”
