Yukoners can count on our Family Doctor Guarantee: Kate White
October 6, 2025
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 06, 2025
Territories of the Kwanlin Dün First Nation and Ta’an Kwäch’än Council, Whitehorse, Yukon – Today, Kate White announced her plan to connect every Yukoner with access to a primary care provider.
“Right now, so many Yukoners who need healthcare are forced to line up here in the early morning, or wait in the ER for hours,” said White, standing in front of the Public Walk-in Clinic in downtown Whitehorse. “Because of Liberal and Conservative Yukon Party governments, there are now more than 4,000 Yukoners stuck on the primary care provider waitlist. You can count on our Yukon NDP team to make healthcare better – starting with our Family Doctor Guarantee.”
Under the Liberal government, the primary care provider waitlist ballooned due to a growing shortage of primary care providers. Last year, zero out of 153 locum doctors chose to remain in the Yukon and only 7 per cent of doctors feel supported by the current government.
Under the Conservative Yukon Party, doctors and nurses publicly called out the then-government for its failures to invest in beds, and years of disrespect. Nurses, unions and professional associations sounded the alarm about staff morale about the Yukon’s deteriorating reputation as a desirable place to work. When Currie Dixon was at the cabinet table, his government refused to support doctors, leading every one of the six members on the Yukon Medical Council, an organization which advocated on behalf of physicians, to resign.
Many Yukoners on the list have waited years for care, including Carrie Kelly, whose family doctor left her practice around 2016.
“For years, I waited for a family doctor, but didn’t get the care I needed. It means I’ve been forced to rely on a patchwork of care, from the ER to the old walk-in clinic,” explained Kelly. “I now visit the midlife clinic, and had to give up my place on the waiting list to see a nurse practitioner. Wait times are long and I have seen three different providers. Yukoners deserve better. With Kate White’s plan, people like me will get the primary care we need.”
The Yukon NDP will build on their successful work with the Yukon Medical Association (YMA) to recruit and retain new family doctors to provide care in the territory. In line with the YMA’s caseload standards, each new family doctor will take on an average of 500 patients. These doctors will also provide rapid-access appointments to their patients.
Beyond this, the Yukon NDP will guarantee access to a primary care provider for every Yukoner by:
- Bringing in alternative payment models to offer physicians salaried positions at locations like the public walk-in clinic so they can provide team-based care;
- Creating a Yukon version of the Williams Lake physician support model to offer new and visiting doctors, specialists and surgeons support to navigate relocation and find social and cultural connections;
- Bringing in an audit system and paying physicians on-time with a 60-day pay rule; and
- Working with the YMA to modernize the digital health record program, so that Yukon’s frontline workers can focus on caring for people, instead of doing paperwork.
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