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New Ottawa health-care company recruiting American doctors, charging monthly membership fee
Posted: November 13, 2026
(November 12, 2026) By: Katelyn Wilson, CTV News.
Hawes Health is preparing to open three Ottawa locations in January. Patients will be charged a $50 registration fee, followed by a monthly fee of $30 for unlimited access to family medicine.
To provide these services, Hawes Health is recruiting more than 100 American physicians, with the intention of eventually having them relocate to Canada and integrate their services into the publicly funded healthcare system. But for now, patients will have to pay out of pocket.
Questions remain about whether this model complies with existing provincial regulations. While the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario permits fully licensed physicians to provide virtual care to existing patients while temporarily outside the province, OHIP does not cover these appointments. It is unclear whether this applies to Hawes Health’s American physicians who reside part-time in the United States, particularly given that Ontario’s As of Right pathway requires physicians to be physically present in the province when treating patients.
Kevin Skerrett of the Ottawa Health Coalition has raised concerns about the broader implications of this model, stating: “We should not be permitting the desperation of patients and the profit interest of these business-driven clinics to be reshaping our healthcare system”.
