More than 1,500 Manitobans sought medical care outside Canada amid long wait times, report says

More than 1,500 Manitobans are estimated to have left the country for non-emergency medical treatment last year, according to new estimates from the Fraser Institute, underscoring ongoing concerns about long wait times and access to care within Canada’s publicly funded health-care system.

The think tank estimates that 105,529 Canadians travelled abroad for medical care in 2025, with 1,585 of those patients coming from Manitoba. The figures are based on physician survey data and national procedure counts, and reflect patients who sought treatment outside Canada after being unable to wait for care at home.

The report comes as Canadians continue to face lengthy delays for treatment. Nationally, patients waited an average of nearly 29 weeks from referral by a family doctor to receiving treatment. That total includes about 15 weeks waiting to see a specialist, followed by an additional 13.3 weeks waiting for medically necessary treatment after the specialist visit.

According to the Fraser Institute, that post-specialist wait alone exceeds what physicians consider clinically reasonable by nearly 4.5 weeks.

“These numbers are not insubstantial,” the report states, pointing to a “sizeable number of Canadians whose health-care needs could not be met in a reasonable time within Canada’s borders.”

Researchers say there are multiple reasons patients may leave the country for care. In some cases, patients are sent abroad by provincial health systems because certain procedures, equipment, or specialized services are unavailable locally. In others, patients choose to seek care elsewhere due to concerns about quality, access to advanced medical technologies, or the risk of their condition worsening while waiting.

The study also highlights the potential consequences of long delays, including poorer treatment outcomes, increased disability, or, in extreme cases, death. For some patients, the decision to leave Canada is driven simply by a desire to return to work and normal life sooner.

To produce the estimates, the Fraser Institute relied on its annual Waiting Your Turn survey, which polls physicians across 12 major medical specialties, including orthopedic surgery, cardiology, oncology, and neurosurgery. Physicians are asked what percentage of their patients received non-emergency treatment outside Canada over the past year. Those figures are then combined with national procedure data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information.

While the report does not track individual patient outcomes, it argues that the growing number of Canadians seeking care abroad reflects deeper structural issues within the health-care system.

“That a considerable number of Canadians travelled abroad and paid to escape the well-known failings of the Canadian health-care system speaks volumes about how well the system is working for them,” the report concludes.

This story was originally published in The Winnipeg Sun. It is republished under a Creative Commons license as part of the Local Journalism Initiative.