TORONTO, Oct. 13, 2022— The Ontario Medical Association is encouraged that police are enforcing new federal legislation with penalties for harassing or intimidating health-care workers.
Hate crimes and the physical, verbal and online harassment of health-care workers are unacceptable and have no place in Canadian society. Unfortunately, this behaviour became all too common during the pandemic against people working on the front lines of the pandemic trying to keep their communities safe. Many of the acts and comments were also racist, sexist and/or antisemitic.
The OMA strongly supported amendments to the Criminal Code that came into effect in January and doubled to 10 years the maximum prison sentence for those who harass or intimate health-care workers and patients.
Ottawa police issued an arrest warrant today for a Windsor, Ont. man in connection with multiple threats made by phone against Dr. Nili Kaplan-Myrth, an Ottawa family physician. The charges were the hate-motivated offence of harassing communication, harassment by repeated communication, mischief and intimidation of the health service, the new federal charge. The hate-motivated charges include acts of antisemitism.
The Ontario Medical Association represents Ontario’s 43,000-plus physicians, medical students and retired physicians, advocating for and supporting doctors while strengthening the leadership role of doctors in caring for patients. Our vision is to be the trusted voice in transforming Ontario’s health-care system.
For more information, please contact:
Leslie Shepherd, OMA Director of Earned and Social Media
media@oma.org