The Ontario government has announced an additional $330 million every year in children's health services.
"This new funding will provide our frontline health care partners with the tools they need to immediately provide more children with the care they need close to home," said Premier Doug Ford.
The money is intended to be spread across 100 initiatives across the province, including emergency care, surgeries, ambulatory services, diagnostic imaging, and mental health services.
"We're tackling wait times, adding new beds, and building up our health care workforce to ensure everyone in Ontario, including and especially our children and youth, have access to the care they need, when and where they need it," Ford said.
The Health Ministry doesn't have funding specifics yet, but said some initiatives that will affect youth across the province include rapid access clinics that can be used instead of going to emergency departments during respiratory illness season, filling the gap in youth addictions services, vocational support and educational services, and hiring more pediatric surgical operating room staff to increase the number of day surgeries and increase access to diagnostic procedures for children.
Children's Hospital at London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) is among those that will receive funding.
"We want nothing more for our kids than for them to be happy and healthy. This includes ensuring they receive the care they need when they need it," said Children's Hospital President Nash Syed. "This investment will help reduce the time babies, children and youth wait to access care in our emergency departments, ambulatory clinics and for surgical and diagnostic procedures."
On Thursday, Health Minister Sylvia Jones also announced an additional $44 million of funding to hospitals to reduce wait times and provide people with faster and easier access to care in emergency departments.
"Hospitals have the flexibility to decide how to spend this funding on local solutions that will help people receive care faster and reduce their length of stay in an emergency department," a statement from the government read.
It's expected that some money will be spent on hiring additional health care staff, more transportation to help transfer medically stable patients out of emergency departments, and creating new beds.