Perth-Wellington MPP Matthew Rae and Huron-Bruce MPP Lisa Thompson announced a funding boost of $4.3 million for the Huron Perth and Area Ontario Health Team last Friday in Listowel.
This funding, according to Rae, will help link more individuals in the area to essential healthcare services.
“It’s gonna help over 10,000 people get access to primary care in the communities they live in, and it will benefit communities across Huron and Perth counties. The Town of St. Marys, Stratford, Mitchell and Listowel in particular on my side, and then obviously a bunch on the Huron side for Minister Thompson,” Rae explained.
The announcement took place at the Fisher Family Primary Care Centre in Listowel. The funds will be distributed among regional family health teams that make up the Huron Perth and Area Health Team. This includes Listowel-Wingham and Area FHT, STAR FHT, Stratford FHT, Huron Community FHT, Maitland Valley FHT, Clinton FHT, Happy Valley FHT, Bluewater Area FHT and Grand Bend Area Community Health Centre and Family Health Organization.
The Listowel-Wingham and Area Family Health team will lead efforts to set up more outreach clinics for those without a primary care physician – meaning people who currently don’t have one – aiming to connect them with a doctor.
MPP Thompson stated that the leadership from the Listowel-Wingham Family Health Team has been very helpful.
“It’s great the collaboration that we see headed up by the Listowel-Wingham Family Health Team across Midwestern Ontario, where they introduced unattached clinics, and they’ve been highly successful,” Thompson shared.
This funding is part of the provincial government’s commitment to ensure everyone in Ontario has access to a primary care physician by 2029.
Huron-Bruce MPP Lisa Thompson and Perth-Wellington MPP Matthew Rae (middle holding sign) alongside leaders and board members from local family health teams and local dignitaries outside the Fisher Family Primary Care Centre in Listowel Ontario after announcing $4.3 million for expanding primary care services in the region. April 17, 2026 (Photo by Ryan Drury)
Robin Spence Haffner, Executive Director of the Listowel-Wingham and Area Family Health Team mentioned that this money will help enhance what family health teams provide as well as increase their staff numbers.
“What it allows all of the family health teams and all the physicians groups to do is see more patients. So they’re able to attach more patients at local clinics. So it really builds our capacity to get more people attached to teams-based care throughout the entire region,” Spence Haffer said proudly. “We’ve got funding for at least 18 new clinical staff. So that’s everything from nurse practitioners to nurses to social workers to physiotherapists. So really whatever will help get more people attached (to a physician), so we’re really excited about it.”
Spence Haffner also noted that anyone in the region without a primary care physician looking for one can register online for assistance with that process.
“So what people need to do is sign up for Health Care Connect. If you just Google it, you can get signed up whether you don’t have a family doctor or if you do but they’re far away,” she pointed out.
A lot of folks around here do have a family doctor but it’s often located in cities like Kitchener, Waterloo or London which can be quite a trip especially for our older residents.
You can sign up for Health Care Connect here: https://hcc3. hcc. moh. gov. on. ca/HCCWeb/faces/layout HCCReg Splash. xhtml
Source link
Source link
