How Ontario Parties Fare on Disability and COVID

Ontario’s provincial election is set for February 27th. Other journalists have written about how the candidates fare on housing, healthcare, and other issues. I wanted to focus on two issues I haven’t seen reported on as often — disability and COVID.

I sent along questions to the four major parties to understand their policies on disability and COVID-19. I received responses from the Ontario Liberal Party but did not hear back from any of the other candidates. To figure out the plans for the other Parties, I’ve looked at public statements, listened to the recent debate, and examined any available policy documents to try and extrapolate their positions. 

UPDATE (FEB 21 12:15PM): A few hours after I posted this, the NDP put up a one page costing document.

ODSP and Ontario Works (OW)

Question 1: Over 800,000 beneficiaries receive ODSP or OW. Right now, both are well below the poverty line. Meanwhile, the rates of disability continue to rise as the result of the ongoing COVID pandemic. Will you commit to increasing ODSP and/or OW rates, and will they continue to increase along with inflation?

PC Party of Ontario

When asked about ODSP, Doug Ford conflated it with Ontario Works. Ford claimed that: “Healthy young people that are sitting on the couch watching the Flintstones, they should be out there, they should be working.”

According to reporting in The Trillium, since 2019 the Ford government started cutting employment assistance programs, leading to the shut down of at least 11 programs that help disabled Ontarians return to work.

During the recent Ontario Leaders’ debate (see 24:55), Ford said: “You can’t pay people on ODSP if you don’t have an economy.” Ford has been in charge of the province and its economy since 2018. 

The Conservatives were the only Party that did not show up to the 2025 Ontario Election Debate on Disability Issues.

Ontario Liberal Party

Over email, a spokesperson said: “Bonnie would double ODSP and index it to inflation.” This change would occur over the course of two years. They did not reveal any similar plans to increase Ontario Works payments.

Last week, Nickel Belt Ontario Liberal Party candidate Natalie Labbée called this “excessive” in a since-deleted Facebook post. Labbée claimed that she misspoke. I followed up and asked whether all the MPs in the Party were on board with the plan to double ODSP and whether they had a plan to convince Party members who weren’t on board. I received a response with a typo rendering it nonsensical.

During the two-year window that it takes to double ODSP, disabled folks on ODSP will struggle to pay for food, rent, and healthcare. In that time, they could face coercion toward medical assistance in dying. Presenting this context, I asked the spokesperson why they chose to double ODSP over two years rather than making the change immediately, but they declined to respond.

Ontario’s NDP

Marit Stiles did not mention ODSP during the recent Ontario Leaders’ debate. However, according to the platform document released on February 21st, the Party intends to double ODSP and OW.

The costing document shows that the amount of money earmarked for ODSP and OW increases between 2025-2026 and 2026-2027 suggesting it will be phased in over time.

Ontario Green Party

Mike Schreiner intends to immediately double ODSP and OW payments and end government clawbacks for disability benefits. He also called out the Conservatives for keeping disabled folks living in legislated poverty during the recent debate (at 24:21): 

“I’m wondering if Mr. Ford thinks it's okay in a province as wealthy as Ontario that people would be forced to live in legislated poverty on $1,300 a month when average market rent in this province is 600 a month and over 2,000 in Toronto. How can we sleep at night knowing that people with disabilities can't even afford to pay the bills?”

COVID and Long COVID

Question 2: Schools are still a major vector of COVID-19 transmission. Each infection a student, teacher or other staff member develops comes with the risk of developing Long COVID or other complications. Meanwhile, improved air quality and ventilation is linked to a reduction in infectious disease transmission, higher test scores, and improved productivity. Will you commit to improve air quality and ventilation in schools? 

PC Party of Ontario

Doug Ford did not mention this issue during the debate. Journalists including myself have covered the Conservative government's poor track record in this space:

• Breathing room: Why parents and experts are calling for a clean-air revolution in schools

• Pandemic money was meant to clear the air in Ontario schools. Did it work?

Ontario Liberal Party

A spokesperson for the Party wrote that Crombie intended to invest “$22 billion into the school repair backlog and install heating, air conditioning, and air filtration systems that meet the highest health and safety standard in every classroom by doubling annual capital funding for schools.”

Ontario’s NDP

This issue was not mentioned by Marit Stiles during the debate. According to the Party’s Platform and costing documents, they intend to increase funding to schools by $830 million per year to fix the repair backlog but upgrading ventilation is not mentioned.

Ontario Green Party

The Party will allocate $1.6 billion to top up repair and maintenance in schools according to the costed platform. Ventilation is not mentioned in the platform or costing documents.

Question 3:  Health Canada estimates that 2.1 million Canadians are living with Long COVID right now. As COVID-19 continues to circulate, more Ontarians will develop the condition in 2025. However, there is little to no funding for Long COVID clinics in the province. Does your policy ensure that people with Long COVID will have access to healthcare?

Context: Long COVID clinics across Canada have shuttered their doors and folks who are affected continue to experience gaslighting from their healthcare practitioners.

PC Party of Ontario

No mention of Long COVID or Long COVID clinics by Doug Ford or the Party. 

Ontario Liberal Party

A spokesperson for the Ontario Liberal Party provided a generic answer about healthcare but declined to discuss any specifics around Long COVID. 

Ontario’s NDP

Long COVID is not mentioned in the platform released on February 21st.

There is a petition page up to collect emails for a Long COVID strategy — however according to the Wayback Machine, this was posted in 2022 and likely part of the previous Horvath campaign. 

Ontario Green Party

Long COVID is not mentioned in the party platform or accompanying costed plan.

Question 4: Hospital-acquired infections in Ontario have been on the rise in recent years. Several patients have caught COVID-19 in the hospital and have died as a result. Will you commit to making hospitals and other high risk settings like long-term care homes safer by improving air quality and ventilation, and ensuring that staff mask in high-risk settings?

Context: As many as one in three people who are hospitalized with COVID-19 came to the hospital for another medical reason and caught the infection there.

PC Party of Ontario

The PC Party has not explicitly mentioned reducing hospital-acquired infections or improving air quality in long-term care.

Ontario Liberal Party

“Our hospitals are crumbling, staff are dealing with aging infrastructure, and patients are getting sick due to poor air quality and lack of adequate infection prevention measures,” a spokesperson for the Ontario Liberal Party wrote. “Team Bonnie will focus on redeveloping our hospitals across the province.”

For long-term care homes, the spokesperson wrote that Crombie will “modernize LTC design through reviewing and updating the existing LTC design guidelines with a particular focus on infection prevention, detection, control, and reporting.” 

The spokesperson declined to elaborate on what specific infection prevention measures will be implemented. 

Ontario’s NDP

The Ontario’s NDP has not mentioned any of these issues in the platform documents posted on its website. 

Ontario Green Party

In its platform, the Green Party writes they will “improve environmental determinants of health by prioritising clean air [...] in all communities.” The Platform does not address this issue in the context of hospitals or long-term care homes. 

Why COVID still matters?

Since none of the Parties have mentioned the C word or discussed Long COVID, I spoke with Dr. Dick Zoutman of the Canadian COVID Society about the importance of COVID mitigations in 2025.

Zoutman, now an emeritus professor at Queen’s University, chaired the Ontario SARS Scientific Advisory Committee which was responsible for advising the Ontario Government on the management of the 2003 SARS-CoV-1 pandemic.

“The COVID pandemic has had devastating impacts on Canadians and on the health care system in particular. Our political leaders need to address the impacts that COVID has had and is continuing to have given the pandemic has not ended,” said Zoutman. “The spread of COVID is highly preventable now with current technologies, from N95 masks and vaccines, to better ventilation and air filtration systems to germicidal ultraviolet lights.”

Stopping the spread of COVID, he said, would also prevent Long COVID, disability, and deaths.

If you liked reading this, please consider subscribing. I will be writing one to two news stories every month highlighting these issues.

I'm a science and health journalist who is disappointed and fed up with the lack of news coverage surrounding Long COVID, ME/CFS, chronic illness, and disability issues in Canada. I decided to start this newsletter to provide a home for the news stories that don’t get coverage in Canada’s news ecosystem.