A spike in health-care spending during the COVID-19 pandemic could lead to some serious financial challenges for provinces as they work to rebuild their health systems in the aftermath, according to the Canadian Institute for Health Information.
The spending surge is expected to reach a record $308 billion in 2021, say newly released projections from CIHI.
That is roughly $8,019 per Canadian.
“COVID-19 resulted in the single biggest increase in health spending we have ever seen in this country,” CIHI president David O’Toole said in a news release.
Health spending is projected to have increased 12.8 per cent between 2019 and 2020. That’s more than triple the average annual growth rate seen from 2015 to 2019, which was approximately four per cent per year.
Spending is estimated to have increased another 2.2 per cent between 2020 and 2021.
The agency said its estimates will be updated as final spending amounts are tabulated, and may be less accurate than normal given the nature of emergency funds spent during the pandemic.
Still, the numbers add up to a troubling future as Canada works to recover from the pandemic and get health systems back on their feet.
“We know that in times of fiscal restraint we have less to spend on health care, so there’ll be some decisions in the future. It’s obviously a finite pot of money,” said Brent Diverty, vice-president of data strategies and statistics for CIHI.
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Historically, increases in health spending have been in step, or slightly greater, than increases in economic growth. When provinces hit hard times, they usually spend less on health care.
But in 2020, the spike in health spending to scale up system capacity, testing and other pandemic responses was paired with a serious contraction in the economic health of the country. The GDP dropped 4.6 per cent that year, according to the latest federal budget.
Health-care backlogs
Now, as the fourth wave of the pandemic ebbs and health systems turn to the surgical and primary care backlogs left in its wake, they’ll have to figure out how to handle the extra load while carrying mounting health-spending deficits.
There may be other pandemic developments, however, like the rise in virtual care, that could offset some of the costs moving forward.
Some innovations are “in fact making the system more sustainable or affordable,” Diverty said.
Even before the pandemic, health spending had been rising steadily for decades.
-From The Canadian Press, last updated at 6:55 a.m. ET
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People wait to be vaccinated against COVID-19 in Zagreb, Croatia, Thursday, Nov. 4, 2021. Countries throughout Central and Eastern Europe reported spiraling coronavirus cases Thursday, with several hitting new daily records in the regions that have lower vaccination rates than the rest of the continent. (Darko Bandic/The Associated Press)
As of Thursday afternoon, more than 248.4 million cases of COVID-19 had been reported worldwide, according to Johns Hopkins University’s coronavirus case tracker. The reported global death toll stood at more than five million.
In Europe, top officials at the World Health Organization said Thursday that the continent has seen a more than 50 per cent jump in coronavirus cases in the last month, making it the epicentre of the pandemic despite an ample supply of vaccines.
“There may be plenty of vaccine available, but uptake of vaccine has not been equal,” WHO emergencies chief Dr. Michael Ryan said during a news briefing on Thursday.
He called for European authorities to “close the gap” in vaccinations. However, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said countries that have immunized more than 40 per cent of their populations should stop and instead donate their doses to developing countries that have yet to offer their citizens a first dose.
“No more boosters should be administered except to immuno-compromised people,” Tedros said.
Health workers conduct COVID-19 tests on travellers at the exit of Yantai Railway Station in China’s eastern Shandong province. (AFP/Getty Images)
Canada is among the countries that have started to offer third doses and boosters to at-risk populations, such as the immuno-compromised, older and Indigenous people.
The director of WHO’s 53-country Europe region, Dr. Hans Kluge said the countries in the region were at “varying stages of vaccination rollout” and that regionwide an average of 47 per cent of people were fully vaccinated. Only eight countries had 70 per cent of their populations fully vaccinated.
The increase in Europe’s COVID-19 marks the fifth consecutive week cases have risen across the continent, making it the only world region where COVID-19 is still increasing. The infection rate was by far the highest in Europe, which reported some 192 new cases per 100,000 people.
“We are clearly in another wave,” Sweden’s chief epidemiologist, Anders Tegnell, said Thursday. “The increased spread is entirely concentrated in Europe.”
In the Asia-Pacific region, China is on high alert at its ports of entry as strict policies on travel in and out of the country are enforced to reduce COVID-19 risks amid a fresh outbreak, less than 100 days out from the opening of the Beijing Winter Olympics.
In Africa, health officials in South Africa reported 344 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday and 29 additional deaths, bringing the number of reported deaths in the country to 89,220.
In the Middle East, Bahrain has authorized the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for emergency use for children aged between five and 11 years.
-From Reuters, The Associated Press and CBC News, last updated at 2:30 p.m. ET
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday named Brendan Carr, the senior Republican on the Federal Communications Commission, as the new chairman of the agency tasked with regulating broadcasting, telecommunications and broadband.
Carr is a longtime member of the commission and served previously as the FCC’s general counsel. He has been unanimously confirmed by the Senate three times and was nominated by both Trump and President Joe Biden to the commission.
The FCC is an independent agency that is overseen by Congress, but Trump has suggested he wanted to bring it under tighter White House control, in part to use the agency to punish TV networks that cover him in a way he doesn’t like.
Carr has of late embraced Trump’s ideas about social media and tech. Carr wrote a section devoted to the FCC in “ Project 2025,” a sweeping blueprint for gutting the federal workforce and dismantling federal agencies in a second Trump administration produced by the conservative Heritage Foundation.
Trump has claimed he doesn’t know anything about Project 2025, but many of its themes have aligned with his statements.
Carr said in a statement congratulating Trump on his win that he believed “the FCC will have an important role to play reining in Big Tech, ensuring that broadcasters operate in the public interest, and unleashing economic growth.”
“Commissioner Carr is a warrior for Free Speech, and has fought against the regulatory Lawfare that has stifled Americans’ Freedoms, and held back our Economy,” Trump said in a statement on Sunday. “He will end the regulatory onslaught that has been crippling America’s Job Creators and Innovators, and ensure that the FCC delivers for rural America.”
The five-person commission has a 3-2 Democratic majority until next year, when Trump gets to appoint a new member.
Also a prolific writer of op-eds, Carr wrote in an opinion piece for The Wall Street Journal last month decrying an FCC decision to revoke a federal award for Elon Musk’s satellite service, Starlink. He said the move couldn’t be explained “by any objective application of the facts, the law or sound policy.”
“In my view, it amounted to nothing more than regulatory lawfare against one of the left’s top targets: Mr. Musk,” Carr wrote.
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PROVO, Utah (AP) — Shortly after sunset on Saturday, Rabbi Chaim Zippel clasped an overflowing cup of wine and a tin of smelling spices as he marked the end of the Sabbath with a small Jewish congregation at his home near Provo, which doubles as the county’s only synagogue.
The conclusion of the ceremony known as Havdalah set off a mad dash to change into blue and white fan gear and drive to the football stadium at nearby Brigham Young University, the Utah private school run by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Zippel never expected to become a BYU fan, or even a football follower, but that changed when the school where 98.5% of students belong to the faith known widely as the Mormon church added its first Jewish quarterback to the roster.
Retzlaff has earned a hero’s embrace by rabbis and others in Provo’s tiny but tight-knit Jewish community while also becoming a favorite of the broader BYU fan base that lovingly calls him the “BYJew.”
One of just three Jewish students in a student body of 35,000, the quarterback and team co-captain who worked his way into the starting lineup has used his newfound stardom to teach others about his own faith while taking steps to learn more about Judaism for himself.
“I came here thinking I might not fit in with the culture, so this will be a place where I can just focus on school and football,” Retzlaff told The Associated Press. “But I found that, in a way, I do fit. People are curious. And when everybody around you is so faith-oriented, it makes you want to explore your faith more.”
The junior college transfer from Corona, California, formed a fast friendship with the Utah rabbi when he came to BYU in 2023. The two began studying Judaism fundamentals each week in the campus library, which would help Retzlaff speak confidently about his faith in public and in his many required religion classes.
BYU undergraduates must take classes about the Book of Mormon, the gospel of Jesus Christ and the faith’s core belief that families can be together forever if marriages are performed in temples. Retzlaff said he was surprised to find many references to the Jewish people in the Book of Mormon. Some classmates and fans have even called him “the chosen one,” referring to both his success on the field and a Latter-day Saint belief that members of the Jewish faith are God’s chosen people.
“It’s a lot of respect, honestly. They’re putting me on a mantel sometimes, and I’m like, ‘Whoa guys, I don’t know about that,'” he said with a laugh.
Retzlaff, 21, has embraced becoming an ambassador for his faith in college football and in a state where only 0.2% of residents are Jewish. The redshirt junior wears a silver Star of David necklace on campus and attends dinners on Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest, at the rabbi’s house during the offseason.
He led Utah County’s first public Hanukkah menorah lighting last year at Provo’s historic courthouse, brought a kosher food truck to a team weight training and wrapped tefillin with Zippel in the BYU stadium. The tefillin ritual performed by Jewish men involves strapping black boxes containing Torah verses to the arm and forehead as a way of connecting to God.
“I told Jake, I said, after doing this here, after connecting to God on your terms inside the stadium, no amount of pressure will ever get to you,” Zippel said. “I think there’s no greater example of finding your corner of the world where you’re supposed to make your impact and making that impact.”
Retzlaff is affiliated with the Reform denomination of Judaism, which melds Jewish tradition with modern sensibilities, often prioritizing altruistic values and personal choice over a strict interpretation of Jewish law. He plays football on Friday nights and Saturdays during Shabbat and says sports have become a way to connect with his faith and to inspire young Jewish athletes.
Among them is Hunter Smith, a 14-year-old high school quarterback from Chicago who flew to Utah with his dad, brother and a group of Jewish friends to watch Retzlaff play. The brothers sported Retzlaff’s No. 12 jerseys, and their father Cameron wore a “BYJew” T-shirt depicting Retzlaff emerging from a Star of David, the most recognizable symbol of the faith.
“Being the only Jewish quarterback in my area that I know of, I feel like I get to pave my own path in a way,” Smith said during Saturday’s game. “Jake’s the only Jewish quarterback in college football, so he’s someone I can relate to and is like a role model for me, someone I can really look up to.”
When Retzlaff lit Provo’s giant menorah last December, Zippel said he was touched to hear the quarterback speak about the importance of his visibility at a time when some Jewish students didn’t feel safe expressing their religious identity on their own campuses amid heightened antisemitism in the United States.
His presence has been especially impactful for BYU alumna Malka Moya, 30, who had struggled to navigate her intersecting identities on the campus as someone who is both Jewish and a Latter-day Saint.
“Jake feels very comfortable wearing his Star of David all the time,” said Moya, who lives near Provo. “I haven’t always been very comfortable with expressing my Jewish identity. But, more recently, I feel like if he can do it, I can do it.”
