2026-10-15 from hospitalnews.com
Ontario: 31 nurses below the age of 35 left the workforce for every 100 new nurses who started in 2024, finds new MEI report
Canada is burning through its young nurses at an alarming rate as healthcare systems across the country struggle to retain them, reveals a new publication released this morning by the MEI.
“For every 100 nurses under 35 who registered to practise in the country, 34 other young nurses did not renew their registration in 2024,” says Gerard Lucyshyn, vice president of Research at the MEI and author of the report. “While this is an improvement over the year before, the ratio remains high and puts undue pressure on our strained system.”
Across Canada, there were 27,139 nursing positions open in 2025. This is a drop from 2023, but remains roughly three times higher than in 2016.
Read more here