The human cost of Quebec’s Bill 2
A firsthand perspective on the consequences as a patient and recent immigrant
Quebec’s newly passed Bill 2 has sparked unprecedented turmoil across the province’s health care system, stirring large-scale protests among doctors, medical students and patients.
The new legislation ties a significant portion of physicians’ remuneration, 10 per cent, to performance targets assigned by the province. Doctors who fail to meet these targets face pay reductions and heavy penalties, including potential fines of up to $20,000 a day for certain types of protest or non-compliance.
As the news spread, thousands of doctors and supporters filled Montreal’s Bell Centre to demand the suspension of the law, and hundreds have already begun applying to move to Ontario and New Brunswick for work. This exodus threat, coupled with the risk of clinics closing, has cast a shadow over the future of accessible care in Quebec.
The government may see Bill 2 as an efficiency reform, but for patients and doctors, it feels like the beginning of a rupture.
As the author of this opinion piece, I rely on media reports and my own lived experience. I am by no means an expert on health policy. However, as an ordinary citizen and a recent immigrant, the impact feels deeply personal.
When I arrived in Quebec in 2019, coinciding with the start of my PhD at Concordia University, I joined the ranks of over a million Quebecers waiting for a family doctor.
After a six-year wait that felt as improbable as “getting the moon in the sky,” I was finally assigned one in September 2025. At my first appointment, I met my compassionate family doctor, a graduate of McGill University and Université de Montréal.
Behind wait-time statistics are real people wondering whether anyone will care for them when it matters most.
Recently, I was struck by a complex illness and once again saw the diligence and care of my family doctor. She responded quickly to my concerns, proactively scheduling tests and even carrying out procedures herself in her office. Her empathy and commitment far exceeded my expectations.
In a strained system, this kind of attentive care feels less like a service and more like a lifeline.
Not everyone shares this luck. The health care system is often criticized for overcrowded emergency rooms and years-long waits for a family doctor. Yet a single caring physician can make all the difference in a patient’s well-being.
Having grown up in Bangladesh with physician parents, I’ve seen how much compassion matters. They spent countless hours giving free consultations to neighbours—not always with cures, but always with reassurance. No performance metric can measure the comfort of being heard or the trust built over time.
This is why Quebec’s approach to Bill 2 is alarming. By forcing physicians into strict performance targets and imposing harsh financial penalties, the law risks driving many committed doctors out of the province, leaving patients vulnerable once again. Personally, losing a doctor I waited six years to find is a daunting prospect.
You cannot fix a doctor shortage by punishing the doctors you have left.
Part of the problem is the chronic shortage of physicians, a longstanding issue in Quebec and across Canada. Recent provincial policies have also hurt English-language universities such as Concordia and McGill, limiting their capacity to prepare and train future medical graduates. The ripple effects on health care accessibility cannot be ignored.
Weakening the institutions that produce future doctors only deepens the very crisis Bill 2 claims to solve.
Legislators and policymakers must recognize that compassion, trust and continuity of care are not just numbers; they are the lifeblood of a healthy society.
When policymakers reduce medicine to performance metrics, they risk reducing patients to data points, too.
