How Ontario slashed wait times for cancer treatments

One year ago, the Ontario government made a decision: Patients shouldn’t have to wait up to a year to access cancer treatments. This week, the results of that decision are in, and they’re impressive.

Since launching on October 7, 2025, Ontario’s Funding Accelerated for Specific Treatments (FAST) program has fast-tracked 10 new life-extending cancer treatments to patients. The data is striking. Patients who accessed cancer treatments through FAST waited an average of 55 days in 2026, compared with patients who waited approximately 300 days outside the program in 2025. That’s five times faster.

For anyone with a cancer diagnosis, that difference isn’t abstract. It’s a chance to access novel treatments with better outcomes.

Here’s how Ontario did it: Instead of waiting two to three years for drug pricing negotiations to conclude before new treatments are added to the province’s public drug plan, FAST makes eligible medicines available to patients as soon as they have received Health Canada approval and a positive recommendation from Canada’s Drug Agency. The pricing negotiations continue in parallel, while patients are receiving treatment.

Ontario didn’t cut corners. It simply stopped making patients wait for a lengthy bureaucratic process that has nothing to do with the safety or efficacy of a drug. That’s what makes this milestone so significant. It proves that speed and rigour don’t have to be in conflict.

FAST’s first year makes a compelling case for two things: making the program permanent in Ontario and expanding it beyond cancer treatments to a broader range of new medicines.

But the bigger opportunity is national.

Currently, Ontario is the exception, not the rule. Patients in other provinces and territories wait up to four months longer for high-priority cancer treatments. Four months is a lifetime, especially when it comes to cancer treatments.

Each province and territory faces its own realities: different resources, systems and capacity. There is no one-size-fits-all approach. But FAST’s success offers something valuable to all of them – a working example and important lessons learned, as they each grapple with how to accelerate access to new, innovative medicines for their own populations.

Dr. Bettina Hamelin is the President & CEO of Innovative Medicines Canada, the national association representing Canada's innovative pharmaceutical industry.

Originally published online at: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/adv/article-how-ontario-slashed-wait-times-for-cancer-treatments/ 

The views expressed are those of the author(s). Canada Healthwatch publishes a range of perspectives and does not necessarily endorse the opinions presented.