Charlotte County will be among the first regions to receive one of the Holt government’s new highly anticipated community care clinics.
Community care clinics were promised in two areas—St. Stephen in 2025 and Blacks Harbour the following year—both in mandate letters and in the speech from the throne.
According to the plan, ten clinics will be established in the first 18 months of the new government’s mandate.
Mayor Allan MacEachern said he was excited to see the full mandate letters and the ambitious timeline for his community.
“We are here to support. We do have developments that could work with their clinic and help our developments and get us a clinic all in one package. So, I’m very excited about that,” he said in an interview.
The community, as does most of Charlotte County, is trying to recruit and retain doctors. MacEachern feels this model is key to making that successful.
“It will help bring doctors because they need collaborative care,” he said. “So they can work their hours, they don’t like to do administration, (and) if they need to take a day off.”
According to the New Brunswick Medical Society, about 90,000 New Brunswickers are on the waiting list for a family physician.
“We’re going to have to do that because the doctors today do not want to buy their practice anymore and they don’t take on as many patients as previous doctors did,” he said, adding he is grateful for the senior doctors in the community who continue to serve thousands of patients in the region.
He said growth in the community has also increased the need to attract more healthcare professionals to the region.
“You can’t have one without the other,” he said. “If you want to have more housing for that matter and more people coming and other employees or other businesses in our area, this will help encourage people to move here.”
MacEachern said he does feel the timeline is ambitious but has written to the new Health Minister Dr. John Dornan about the clinic.
“I was very encouraged by the letters that went out and, and the commitment to those political promises in writing,” he said. “That’s huge.”
The next clinic in Charlotte County is planned for Blacks Harbour in 2026.
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