Media Release November 18, 2025
November 18, 2025
For Immediate Release,
The Statement Negatively Affects Public Universal Health Care.
“ Every year, thousands of Nova Scotians book free appointments through the Provincial Mental Health and Addictions Intake Line (1-855-922-1122) for support with their mental health. To help Nova Scotians get more timely care, a new, innovative program was launched in July. Through our partnership with private clinicians, more mood and anxiety appointments can be offered through the intake line.
More options mean shorter wait times and more timely care for Nova Scotians. This is just one example of how Nova Scotians have more access to universal addiction and mental health care.
Other programs offered as part of universal access include supports delivered through our partners at the IWK Health and Nova Scotia Health, programs offered at local community organizations, free counselling online at Access Wellness, walk-in support for substance use at Recovery Support Centres, walk-in help for youth at Anchor Youth Spaces, and much more.’’ Department of Health and Wellness, November 17, 2025
The following is our response to Nova Scotia Health and Wellness' statement regarding mental health and addictions.
Although the statement promotes expanding mental health supports, it normalizes and celebrates the growing reliance on private clinicians within the public system. This has several consequences that undermine the principles and sustainability of universal health care.
1. It reframes privatization as “innovation,” masking the real issue: underinvestment in public services.
The statement implies that partnering with private clinicians is an “innovative” way to improve timely access. In reality, it shifts attention away from the root problem—chronic underfunding, understaffing, and long waits in the public mental health system. When privatization is presented as a solution rather than an emergency stopgap, governments face less pressure to fix the public system, allowing inequities to deepen.
2. It creates a two-tiered health system, eroding universality over time.
Even if the appointments are free at the point of use, contracting out care to private providers creates a parallel track of service delivery. Over time, clinicians may be drawn out of the public system to take better-paid private contracts, reducing capacity within public hospitals and clinics. This leads to longer public waits and more incentives for further privatization—a cycle that undermines universality.
3. It diverts public dollars into private pockets, weakening the public system’s long-term capacity.
Money spent on private contracts is money not invested in hiring, training, and retaining public-sector psychologists, social workers, and counsellors. Private delivery almost always costs more per patient. These funds could instead build sustainable public services, but instead they support short-term outsourcing that does not expand permanent public infrastructure.
4. It misleads the public by implying that partnering with private clinicians expands universal access.
True universal access means publicly delivered, publicly funded care that is accessible everywhere based on need, not on market availability. Private partnerships do not create universal care; they patch holes in an under-resourced system. Calling these arrangements “universal access” blurs the line between public and private delivery, making it easier for governments to continue eroding public capacity without public scrutiny.
5. It risks reducing equity of care, especially for rural and marginalized communities.
Private clinicians tend to be unevenly distributed—often concentrated in urban areas where they can sustain private practices. Relying on them for universal care can worsen regional disparities, leaving rural communities with fewer public options and inconsistent service availability.
6. It allows the government to claim progress while avoiding structural reform.
By highlighting partnerships with private clinicians alongside existing public programs, the statement attempts to create the impression of a fully integrated, robust system. In reality, outsourcing is a stop-gap measure that allows the government to say “more options” exist without addressing fundamental issues such as:
understaffing
lack of permanent public-sector mental health positions
burnout among mental health workers
wage disparities that drive clinicians out of public employment
Media Contact
Jennifer Benoit, Provincial Coordinator, Nova Scotia Health Coalition
902-406-9422
coordinator@nshealthcoalition.ca
Nova Scotia Health Coalition, PO Box 8601 RPO CSC, Halifax, Nova Scotia
The Nova Scotia Health Coalition is a political but non-partisan organization committed to defending, strengthening and extending public health care.