Bill 19: Patient-to-Nurse Ratios for Hospitals Act, 2025

This bill directly affects hospitals and healthcare facilities in Ontario — including public hospitals, rehabilitation centres, palliative care units, and mental health inpatient facilities. Administrators running these facilities would need to hire and schedule significantly more nurses (nurse practitioners, registered nurses, and registered practical nurses) to meet the prescribed ratios across critical care, inpatient, palliative, specialized, and rehabilitative units. Day-to-day staffing, shift scheduling, and workforce recruitment would be heavily impacted. Both large hospital networks and smaller community hospitals would be affected, though smaller facilities with tighter budgets may face proportionally greater challenges in meeting the mandated staffing levels.