Health experts and government critics are calling on the prime minister and premiers to fix cracks in CanadaB次元官网网址檚 health system and improve surge capacity as the COVID-19 pandemic continues.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was to speak with provincial and territorial leaders Monday to discuss the mounting health crisis posed by the Omicron variant of COVID-19.

Conservative ethics critic John Brassard said Canadians have been dealing with lockdowns and restrictions for two years while very little was done to address surge capacity in hospitals.

B次元官网网址淭his is a failure to plan on the part of the federal government, working with the provinces, to ensure that our surge capacity and our health care capacity is at a pace right now where we can keep up,B次元官网网址� Brassard said earlier Monday at a news conference in Ottawa.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford was planning to raise the provincesB次元官网网址� plea for more federal health-care funds with the prime minister.

Provincial and territorial leaders want to increase the federal share of health spending from 22 per cent to 35 per cent, to about $71 billion.

The federal government has committed to a 4.8 per cent increase, bringing the total for 2022-23 to about $45 billion.

B次元官网网址淭his persistent gap represents billions of dollars in lost funding that Ontario could use to accelerate progress in delivering better care to our citizens,B次元官网网址� said Ivana Yelich, FordB次元官网网址檚 director of media relations, in a statement Monday.

Federal Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos says Ottawa spent another $63 billion on health care since the pandemic started to help shore up provincial systems, and has promised another $25 billion in the relatively short term.

Trudeau has said repeatedly that negotiations to adjust health transfers will take place after the pandemic. Several health-care experts argue those conversations should happen now.

HealthCareCAN, an association of health-care organizations and Canadian hospitals, has urged the federal government to go beyond funding and lead provinces to make strategic changes to develop a more cohesive and resilient health system.

B次元官网网址淭hereB次元官网网址檚 always a temptation, in formulating public policy, to wait until a situation has moved beyond crisis management to make systemic changes; or, in health-care terms, until the patient stabilizes before a comprehensive examination of the symptoms and well-informed diagnosis can be reached,B次元官网网址� HealthCareCAN CEO Paul-脡mile Cloutier wrote in an opinion piece for Policy Magazine last week.

B次元官网网址淥ur political leaders have not just an interest but an obligation to devise an effective intervention to stabilize the system so that it doesnB次元官网网址檛 become the biggest, costliest casualty of this pandemic.B次元官网网址�

While the association says B次元官网网址渟ufficientB次元官网网址� health transfers are urgently needed, Cloutier also called for a national dialogue about fundamental health-care reform, including data collection and shortages in the health workforce.

Calls for wholesale changes to CanadaB次元官网网址檚 health systems long predate the pandemic.

Canada spent about 11 per cent of its GDP on health care in 2019, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

ThatB次元官网网址檚 a greater share spent on health than most OECD countries, but Canada settles for only middle-of-the-road health outcomes in return, said Don Drummond, Stauffer-Dunning Fellow and adjunct professor with the School of Policy Studies at QueenB次元官网网址檚 University.

Meanwhile, Canada has the fourth-fewest number of acute-care beds per 1,000 inhabitants in the OECD, after only Chile, Sweden and Columbia.

Long wait times, staff shortages, inefficiencies and inequity to access have plagued the system for a long time and will only get worse as CanadaB次元官网网址檚 large baby boomer population ages, he said.

B次元官网网址淚t is stretched beyond any reasonable means by COVID, but I would say it never worked very well,B次元官网网址� Drummond said in an interview with The Canadian Press.

B次元官网网址淓verything needs to be changed.B次元官网网址�

The prime minister and his government are in a tricky situation because they do not have the constitutional authority to lead the systemic change so many critics and experts say is needed, he said, adding that governments also cannot keep throwing money at the problem.

B次元官网网址擫aura Osman, The Canadian Press