TORONTO – Pharmacare: will free pharmaceutical treatments, even if only for diabetes (according to what emerged in the last days) be adequately covered? In the aftermath of the agreement reached between the Liberals and NDP on the issue of accessibility to certain drugs, the Minister of Finance, Chrystia Freeland, assures that this initiative will not jeopardize the fiscal position of Canada – heavily indebted – as the federal government intends respect the spending rules decided in the autumn. 

As we wrote yesterday, the NDP confirmed that there is an agreement with the Liberals that would allow any Canadian with a health card to access free diabetes and birth control medications. Coverage is to be included in the first part of a national pharmacy program with legislation due to be introduced in the House of Commons this week. A “little agreement”, in reality, concerning only one pathology (diabetes: drugs for all other pathologies are excluded) and aimed exclusively at keeping Justin Trudeau’s shaky government standing, since, as is well known, it only survives thanks to the external support of the NDP, the party promoting pharmacare. An expensive “little agreement”, however: we are talking about 800 million dollars. Anyway, Minister Freeland assured that the government is committed to remaining fiscally responsible, which means respecting the spending rules set out in the autumn economic statement.

The federal government has set a goal of keeping the deficit below 1% of GDP starting in 2026-27 and keeping the current fiscal year deficit at or below the spring budget projection of 40, 1 billion dollars. It also aims to reduce the debt-to-GDP ratio in 2024-25 compared to the projection in the autumn economic statement. Ambitious objectives, given the negative economic situation. Liberals assure that they have the 800 million dollars needed to start pharmacare without too many “shocks”. But the only certain thing is that their government, for now, is safe.