Health care surpasses inflation as top national issue of concern: Nanos
Health care surpasses inflation as top national issue of concern: Nanos
With reports of hospital emergency rooms under strain and cases of flu, RSV and COVID-19 spiking across Canada, health care has surpassed inflation and jobs as the top national issue of concern, according to Nanos Research’s weekly tracking.
The latest Nanos tracking shows a four-week change in the top unprompted national issue of concern – unprompted meaning the Canadians surveyed were not provided a list of issues to choose from.
While concern over inflation rose two percentage points over the same period, health care surpassed it and is now at the top of the list at 16.1 per cent, up a full three percentage points in the last four weeks.
“What we’re seeing is that an increasing number of Canadians are focused on health care as their top unprompted national concern, it’s what they're increasingly worried about right now,” said Nanos Research Chair Nik Nanos on the latest episode of CTV News Trend Line.
Health care is also at a two-year high as a national issue of concern, according to Nanos, and it’s been a top concern in Ontario since May – where 89 per cent of respondents said investing in health care was an important priority.
In late November, leaders from five of Ontario’s largest health-care unions issued an urgent appeal to Premier Doug Ford’s government to help ease overburdened hospitals, asking for more investment in staffing rather than spending money in private clinics in order to free up hospital beds. The provincial government also announced in summer that they would be expanding some surgeries into private clinics in an attempt to address backlogs -- a move experts are worried could lead to increased privatization.
The problem extends far beyond Ontario, with reports of health-care systems nationwide struggling to keep up amid staff shortages and a “tripledemic” of COVID-19, flu, and RSV cases.
When it comes to public anger and who Canadians are blaming for the crisis in health care, Nanos said it’s not any individual level of government; instead, “they’re blaming everyone.”
“The reality is that provinces deliver health care as part of their constitutional mandate. But the federal government plays a significant role in funding health care,” said Nanos. “What we know from the polling is that there's been consistent support for publicly-funded health care across Canada, and consistently over time, it's kind of like part of our identity.”
Nanos added Canadians tend to get nervous when politicians refer to any kind of "American style" private health-care system, which is why governments tread "very carefully" around any perception of privatizing health-care services "because they know that it can be a very risky strategy, depending on what they say."
"So I'm not surprised that the Ford government is that soft pedalling anything related to … privatization and connecting that to changes in the health-care system," he said.
Nanos Research conducted 1,000 random interviews recruited from an RDD land-and cell-line sample of Canadians aged 18 years over, ending November 25, 2022. The data is based on a four week rolling average where each week the oldest group of 250 interviews is dropped a new group of 250 is added. A random survey of 1,000 Canadians is accurate 3.1 percentage points, plus or minus, 19 times out of 20.
With files from Alexandra Mae Jones, Creeson Agecoutay, CTV Toronto and CP24
Sign up to receive the most important updates in your inbox two times a week
This undated electron microscope image made available by the U.S. National Institutes of Health in February 2020 shows the Novel Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, orange, emerging from the surface of cells, green, cultured in the lab. (NIAID-RML via AP)
The United States on Saturday downed a suspected Chinese spy balloon off the Carolina coast after it traversed sensitive military sites across North America and became the latest flashpoint in tensions between Washington and Beijing.
Canadians will continue to bundle up in the country's east this weekend as a recent bout of extreme cold persists in much of Quebec and the Atlantic provinces. CTVNews.ca looks at the signs and symptoms for frostbite and hypothermia to watch for if exposed to extreme cold.
A cold snap that triggered Environment Canada alerts involving eight provinces and territories extended into a second day on Saturday, shattering several past temperature records and leaving thousands of customers in Atlantic Canada without power.
The massive white orb drifting across U.S. airspace has triggered a diplomatic maelstrom and is blowing up on social media. A look at what's known about the balloon crossing the U.S. and what isn't.
Eyes were locked on the skies Saturday as a suspected Chinese spy balloon passed over the U.S. Eastern Seaboard -- where local authorities warned civilians against taking potshots with rifles -- before it was shot down when it drifted over the Atlantic Ocean.
The oldest preserved vertebrate brain has been found in a 319-million-year-old fossilized fish skull that was removed from an English coal mine over a century ago.
Canada announced that it had called China's ambassador onto the carpet as Ottawa and Washington expressed their disapproval Friday over a high-altitude balloon found to have been hovering over sensitive sites in the United States.
A group of airlines is asking the Supreme Court of Canada to hear their case after a lower court largely upheld the validity of Canada's air passenger bill of rights.
Medicago Inc., the Quebec-based drug manufacturer of a Canadian COVID-19 vaccine and other plant-based drugs, is being shut down by parent company Mitsubishi Chemical Group.
Eyes were locked on the skies Saturday as a suspected Chinese spy balloon passed over the U.S. Eastern Seaboard -- where local authorities warned civilians against taking potshots with rifles -- before it was shot down when it drifted over the Atlantic Ocean.
Pope Francis warned Saturday that South Sudan's future depends on how it treats its women, as he highlighted their horrific plight in a country where sexual violence is rampant, child brides are common and the maternal mortality rate is the highest in the world.
A train derailment and resulting large fire prompted an evacuation order and a declaration of a state of emergency in an Ohio village near the Pennsylvania state line, covering the area in billows of smoke lit orange by the flames below.
The suspected Chinese surveillance balloon that was found floating over sensitive military sites in the western United States had been tracked by Canada's government since last weekend as it passed through Canadian airspace, sources tell CTV News.
Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland is hosting an in-person meeting Friday with the provincial and territorial finance ministers in Toronto to discuss issues including the current economic environment and the transition to a clean economy.
Paid subscriptions to on-demand care are among the many strategies primary health-care providers in Ontario are adopting in order to meet increased demand for access to doctors in the past year, while also managing staffing shortages.
Ontario fully supports the federal government's push to make health-care funding contingent on data reporting, the province said Thursday as it announced a plan to boost access to primary care doctors.
White-tailed deer may be a reservoir for COVID-19 variants of concern including Alpha, Delta and Gamma, according to new research out of Cornell University that raises questions about whether deer could re-introduce nearly extinct variants back into the human population.
Using a device that might be described as a super-duper cocktail shaker, scientists have fashioned a previously unknown form of ice - one that might exist on our solar system's icy moons - in research that sheds light on water's behaviour under extreme conditions.
The oldest preserved vertebrate brain has been found in a 319-million-year-old fossilized fish skull that was removed from an English coal mine over a century ago.
Three bodies found in a vacant Detroit-area apartment building have been identified as those of three aspiring rappers who went missing nearly two weeks ago, police said Friday.
Mexican actor Pablo Lyle was sentenced Friday to five years in prison for involuntary manslaughter after fatally punching a man during a road rage confrontation in Miami in 2019.
Union members voted down a contract proposal covering tens of thousands of Walt Disney World service workers, saying it didn't go far enough toward helping employees face cost-of-living hikes in housing and other expenses in central Florida.
A California jury has ruled that Elon Musk is not liable for losses experienced by Tesla shareholders following his controversial "funding secured" tweet from 2018.
A Portuguese dog named Bobi has been named the world’s oldest living dog by Guinness World Records, which claims the pooch is also the oldest canine ever recorded.
Canada's newest millionaire, an 18-year-old university freshman from northern Ontario, has achieved a lot of firsts with a recent lottery win. Here is her story.
It took 40 years, but former NHL player and coach Ted Nolan is now one of eight Indigenous ex-NHL-ers being honoured hockey trading cards as a part of Upper Deck's First Peoples Rookie Card series.
Joey Votto has been coming to the Annex Chess Club (ACC), just north of Bathurst and Bloor streets, every week for a few months now, according to Supol.
The world’s largest international Arctic sporting event is underway in northern Alberta, where athletes compete in unique games significant to the cultural identity of the North.
Formula One's governing body confirmed the six engine providers for the 2026-30 cycle on Friday which aims to use sustainable fuels and greater electric power.
Ford will return to Formula One as the engine provider for Red Bull Racing in a partnership announced Friday that begins with immediate technical support this season and engines in 2026.
