Opinion: Veterinary shortage more than a northern Ontario problem

A news release came across my desk last month that raised some good questions regarding veterinary care for livestock in Ontario.

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MPP calls for expansion of Veterinary Incentive Program eligibility

Haldimand-Norfolk’s MPP, with farmer support, is calling on the province to expand the Veterinary Incentive Program’s recognition of “under-serviced areas.”…

The Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA) announced in October a Veterinary Incentive Program (VIP) offering grants up to $50,000 to recent veterinary school graduates wanting to work with livestock in underserviced areas.

This followed an announcement earlier this year that the University of Guelph was expanding its veterinary medicine program through a joint initiative with Lakehead University. The program will be accepting 20 new students in 2025, who will study for the first two years at the northern Ontario-based Lakehead University, finishing at the University of Guelph for the final two years of the program.

The reason for this is that the province identified underserviced areas to be primarily located in northern Ontario.

But the MPP for Haldimand-Norfolk, Bobbi Ann Brady, is questioning the province’s decision to focus only on the north. In a press release she calls on OMAFRA to consider extending the VIP to areas in the southern and eastern parts of the province.

“I’m scratching my head when I think about why (the government) would put the program together like this,” she told our freelance writer Stew Slater when he contacted her for more information.

I admit I’m scratching my head a little bit too.

Graduating more veterinarians is a good start, and necessary. According to the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association (CVMA), “a severe shortage of veterinary professionals is negatively impacting the health and well-being of the veterinary workforce and places additional pressures on the level of quality care they can provide for their clients.”

The CVMA’s American counterpart has also raised alarm over a looming shortage of veterinarians.

Part of the issue is the number of graduates is not keeping pace with the demand for veterinary care. “Canadian veterinary colleges’ annual graduation rates for veterinarians barely meet the rate of attrition from the profession,” the CVMA says and has formed a working group to find long-term solutions.

The $14.7 million investment by OMAFRA to graduate more students in the future will help meet this need. But it is not likely enough. Canada graduates less than 500 new veterinarians from its five veterinary colleges every year, compared to the nearly 3500 annual graduates in the United States.

And the reality is the increased demand is being driven primarily by the increase in pet ownership, fueled in part by the COVID-19 pandemic in recent years, but also by the fact that there are just more pet owners now than in the past. Reasons for this, according to the CVMA and their global counterparts, is that dog, cat and bird owners are willing to spend more money on their animals than they did 10 or 20 years ago. Attitudes towards how pets fit into the family dynamic have also changed. Pets have become “fur babies”, particularly to those without children.

What’s great about the VIP is that it specifically encourages new graduates to pursue large animal medicine. But it isn’t just northern Ontario farmers that are lacking in veterinary services for their animals.

I hope the program is considered a pilot of sorts, that will be expanded to other areas, if the interest is there. OMAFRA wouldn’t disclose how many applications it had received for the program so far, and applications close Jan. 31.

What’s most important is that OMAFRA realizes the need for veterinary support for livestock. Veterinarians play a key role in the food supply chain by ensuring animal health, and food safety.

With the ongoing threat of diseases such as Foot and Mouth disease and African swine fever, veterinarians will play a critical role in prevention, detection and surveillance.

I think the federal government needs to step up to the plate and provide some funding to further support the veterinary profession and livestock care. The recent federal budget allocated $57.5 million over five years to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to create a vaccine bank for FMD and develop response plans, something the swine industry and the CVMA were calling for them to do.

Think of what even half that sum could do to support more veterinary student spaces and incentives. It shouldn’t be up to individual provinces to solve the problem on their own.