A Winnipeg-born gynecologist and bestselling author says she’s had enough with the United States, but she’s also prescribing a stark warning for Canadian voters concerned about the future of their own reproductive health care.
Dr. Jen Gunter, whose books include The Vagina Bible and The Menopause Manifesto, has long been an outspoken women’s health advocate, working to dispel myths around women’s sexual health and bodies, and combat online misinformation.
She’s lived in the United States for three decades, but now says she’s moving back to Canada.
While that was always part of the plan, Gunter says her decision was sped up by U.S. President Donald Trump’s return to the Oval Office earlier this year.
“The absolute just gutting of health care, you know — it’s day after day [that] we’re hearing about some new horror about programs that are being slashed,” Gunter, who plans to live in British Columbia, told CBC News in a Thursday interview from Los Angeles.
“It was predictable, but it’s still kind of horrific to see in real time.”
Gunter, who is currently living in California after previously spending time in Kansas, also said she feels she needs to leave Trump’s America, as abortion restrictions intensify and put lives at risk.
“I left Kansas because when I was practising there, they changed the law and we couldn’t help people who were basically, you know, dying, ill and needed abortions,” she said.
“I’ve been watching this kind of erosion and erosion [of reproductive rights].”
Gunter calls abortion access a canary in a coal mine, describing it as a way for governments to marginalize and control half the population.
“I would say to every Canadian who is listening to this: You should be looking up the voting records of whoever you’re voting for in the upcoming election and see how they have voted on bills related to reproductive rights,” she said.
“If they voted to take your reproductive rights away, they’re going to vote to take other rights away as well.”
There has been a sharp rise in physicians signing up online to learn more about practising north of the border, according to Canadian Medical Association president Dr. Joss Reimer, who urged politicians to act fast in order to make it easier for U.S. doctors to move and work in Canada.
“We’ve seen slashes to their research funding. We’ve seen trusted sources of information like the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] have their websites being controlled and manipulated by government,” Reimer, a Winnipeg physician who was previously the medical lead of Manitoba’s COVID-19 vaccine task force, told CBC News on Thursday.
“We’ve also seen their data sets being altered in a way that makes it harder for us to trust the numbers that are coming out of their tracking.”
Although family doctors in the U.S. earn more than those in other countries, Reimer said that is sometimes not enough to keep them around.
Provinces and territories that can offer less paperwork, more access to research and a more supportive environment for U.S. doctors will have an easier time attracting them, said Reimer.
“That weighs a lot when someone’s thinking about where they want to work.”
Canada needs to expedite immigration pathways for U.S. doctors interested in making the move while provinces sort out licensing issues, Reimer said. However, she added competitive pay and supportive work environments are also crucial to keep doctors in Canada.
Gunter says she’d like to see a more permanent solution to ease licensing barriers for doctors who move interprovincially.
“It doesn’t make sense that you should have to re-apply [for licensure] between different provinces. I really feel there should be a national license.”
She isn’t sure whether she’ll practise again in Canada, but does know she wants to bring her skills back to her home country and make a difference.
“I want to really take all of this 40 years of knowledge and say, ‘These are some gaps, I’d like to help fill those,'” she said.
