Ontario NDP MPPs including Nickel Belt’s France Gélinas are demanding answers from the provincial government, claiming LifeLabs plans to send a portion of Ontario patient lab samples across the border to facilities in the United States
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Ontario NDP MPPs are demanding answers from the provincial government after learning LifeLabs’ plans to send a portion of Ontario patient lab samples across the border to facilities in the United States for testing.
NDP shadow minister for mental health, addictions, and primary care, Dr. Robin Lennox, and Nickel Belt MPP France Gélinas, who is the party’s shadow Minister of Health, have joined with the Ontario Health Coalition to challenge the move, penning a public letter to the Minister of Health expressing concern over the outsourcing of essential medical services.
A press release from the NDP states LifeLabs, “a long-standing private, for-profit community lab provider in Ontario,” was acquired by an American company in 2024. According to the NDP, the acquisition has already led to service cuts within the province, including the closure of medical lab testing facilities in Sudbury and Northwestern Ontario.
Moving samples to the U.S. represents the latest step in the company’s centralization strategy.
The opposition MPPs are criticizing the provincial government’s silence on the matter and raising serious red flags regarding data security and the quality of care.
“It is unacceptable that the Ontario Health Coalition has yet to hear from the Minister of Health about LifeLabs’ recent announcement that Ontario patients’ lab tests will be going to medical laboratories in the United States for testing, instead of labs in Ontario,” stated Lennox in the release. “This Conservative government is allowing more of our health care system to be handed over to American corporations. Ontarians want to know that their health information is going to be protected by this government, not outsourced to the United States.”
Beyond data privacy, the NDP release states there are “growing fears about how this shift will impact standard patient care, particularly for rural and northern communities that have already felt the impact of local lab closures.”
For her part, Gélinas said Ontarians not only expect their medical data to be protected, but that their tax dollars are supporting health care in Ontario, not in the United States.
“Ontarians do not want their personal health information and laboratory testing sent across the border to the United States,” said Gélinas in the release. “Patients expect their medical data to be protected here at home and their health care dollars invested in Ontario hospitals and services. This decision raises serious concerns about privacy, quality, delays, and the dangers of growing privatization of essential parts of our health care system.”
The closure of the LifeLabs regional testing facility in Sudbury and the unconfirmed job losses that could stem from it sparked concern early in the year, with fears that the loss threatened to push frustrated patients toward the already strained emergency department at Health Sciences North for faster, on-site testing. Even the movement of the test results down the closure-prone Highway 69 could cause samples to decay, further impairing health care for the region, critics of the move have said.