Quebecers still getting millions of dollars of health care in Ontario

Tens of thousands of patients from Quebecwere treated at eastern Ontario hospitals in 2017, costing the Quebec government millions of dollars and becoming an issue in the upcoming provincial election.

The Ontario government billed the Quebec government approximately$92.5 millionfor the care of more than 58,000 people from the Outaouaisin Ottawa in 2017, according to the Rgie de l'assurance maladie du Qubec.

The Ottawa Hospital's campuses accounted for almost a third of that money:$30.7 million.

The most patients, 18,624 of them,went to CHEO.

The other Ottawa hospitals included in the figures provided by the Quebec government areMontfortHospital, the Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre, Queensway-Carleton Hospital, the University of Ottawa Heart Instituteand the Bruyre health care centres.

Highestnumbers in Hawkesbury, Ont.

Midway betweenOttawa and Montreal, the HawkesburyGeneral Hospital trumps all the hospitals in Ottawa for visits by Quebecers, pulling in many patients from west of Montreal.

Nearly 32,000 Quebecpatients not just patients from the Outaouais were treated there in 2017, costing Quebec's government more than $36.3 million.

That's approximately a 25 per cent increase since 2015.

In 2016, Quebec Health Minister GatanBarrette said his government was spending too much money on treatment in Hawkesbury, and thatthey were helping pay for a new Hawkesburyhospital building with Quebec's money.

OnTuesday, he said Quebec has a hospital capacity problem and that thegovernment is funding a new hospital in Vaudreuil, west of Montreal.

Franois Legault,leader of the oppositionCoalition avenir Qubec, said the amount of money spent treating Quebecers in Ontario proves the Liberal government's health-care record isn't very good.