Health: 1) Canada’s ER wait times are a symptom of a deeper system failure, new report finds; 2)Health Canada approves weight-loss drug for sleep apnea in patients with obesity

1)Canada’s ER wait times are a symptom of a deeper system failure, new report finds

Courtesy Barrie360.com

By Logan Miller, June 25, 2026

Half of patients admitted to Canadian emergency departments waited more than 16 hours for a hospital bed between April 2024 and March 2025. One in 10 waited more than 48 hours.

A new report from the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) says those numbers are directly tied to what happens upstream in the health-care system, specifically a shortage of spaces in long-term care homes, rehabilitation centres and home care programs.

The bottleneck that backs up the ER

When patients are well enough to leave a hospital inpatient unit but have nowhere appropriate to go, they stay. According to CIHI, those patients wait an average of 24 days in hospital before they can be discharged. During that time, the beds they occupy are unavailable to patients coming in through the emergency department.

Eight per cent of patients admitted to hospital fell into what’s called “alternate level of care” status during the reporting period, meaning they no longer needed acute medical treatment but couldn’t leave because the right supports weren’t in place.

Older adults and people managing chronic conditions like diabetes or high blood pressure were most likely to be among those waiting the longest in the ER.

Cheryl Chui, CIHI’s director of health system analytics, said the findings point to problems that can’t be solved by looking at emergency departments in isolation.

“You can see that sort of bottleneck creates a ripple effect through the system because the extended stays in acute care then delay patients from being able to be moved into those acute care beds, which then means they’re staying in the emergency department … which limits the capacity of emergency departments to be able to care for new patients who are coming in,” Chui said. “Then you see longer wait times across the board.”

Calls for system-wide solutions

CIHI says addressing ER wait times will require action at multiple points in the system, from expanding access to primary care providers so people aren’t using emergency departments for non-urgent issues, to increasing long-term care and home care capacity so hospitals can discharge patients more quickly.

The report was released Thursday. Earlier this week, the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians issued a separate statement describing the “severe strain” emergency departments are under due to what it called “system-wide failures, particularly for older adults.”

The association said older Canadians now make up 20 to 40 per cent of all emergency department visits across the country.

“A widening gap between those in need of enhanced daily support as they age, including long-term care and community-based supports, and timely access to them has made the ED the only accessible option for many older Canadians,” the statement said. “Insufficiencies in long-term care and community capacity directly drive hospital and ED overcrowding. When older adults cannot access these services, they remain in hospital beds after their acute medical issues are resolved.”

*With files from CP

2)Health Canada approves weight-loss drug for sleep apnea in patients with obesity

Courtesy Barrie360.com and Canadian Press

By Nicole Ireland, June 24, 2026.

https://chatgpt.com/c/6a3bd98d-cf3c-83ea-bba4-3f53bb400add#:~:text=A%20CPAP%20machine%20used%20to%20treat%20sleep%20apnea%20sits%20on%20a%20bedside%20table%20in%20Toronto%20following%20Health%20Canada%27s%20approval%20of%20Zepbound%20for%20adults%20with%20obesity%20and%20obstructive%20sleep%20apnea.

Health Canada has approved weight-loss drug Zepbound for treating obstructive sleep apnea in adults with obesity.

The department confirmed that the authorization granted on June 11 makes Zepbound the only GLP-1 drug in Canada approved for the sleep disorder that causes people to stop breathing temporarily because their upper airway is blocked.

That blockage can happen when throat muscles relax or when there is too much fatty tissue around the upper airway.

Sleep apnea causes daytime sleepiness and other potential risks including high blood pressure, heart attacks and strokes, said Dr. Mandeep Singh, a clinician investigator in sleep science at University Health Network in Toronto.

It is often associated with obesity and can be improved with weight loss, he said.

The active ingredient in Zepbound is tirzepatide, which acts on both GLP-1 (glucagon-like peptide-1) and GIP (glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide) hormone receptors to reduce appetite, leading to weight loss.

Eli Lilly’s tirzepatide medications, including Zepbound and diabetes drug Mounjaro, are competitors to Novo Nordisk’s semaglutide drugs Ozempic and Wegovy.

Health Canada spokesperson Marie-Pier Burelle said tirzepatide should be injected once a week and used alongside a reduced calorie diet and increased physical activity in adults with obesity measured by a body-mass index (BMI) of 30kg/m2 or higher.

The drug is “not an immediate replacement” for continuous positive airway pressure — or CPAP — that is a first-line therapy for moderate to severe sleep apnea, Burelle said.

“Patients taking Zepbound should not stop using their CPAP machine without a doctor’s guidance,” she said.

Health Canada’s approval follows Phase 3 clinical trials with patients who had both obesity and sleep apnea.

The studies found sleep apnea patients on tirzepatide who weren’t using a CPAP machine had 25 fewer breathing interruptions per hour compared to five fewer breathing disruptions among those taking a placebo.

Among patients using a CPAP machine, researchers found 29 fewer breathing interruptions an hour among patients taking tirzepatide, compared to six who were taking a placebo.

Singh, who was not involved in the clinical trials, said the severity of obstructive sleep apnea is defined by the number of breathing interruptions per hour of sleep.

People with mild sleep apnea generally have about five to 14 interruptions per hour, he said. Those with moderate sleep apnea have 15 to 30 interruptions and patients with severe sleep apnea have more than 30 an hour, he said.

“A reduction of 25–29 events per hour would represent a meaningful change, potentially shifting someone from severe into a lower severity category depending on where they started,” Singh said.

“I think that’s a welcome step towards offering, you know, another option for patients who have obstructive sleep apnea,” he said.

There are signs that losing weight on other GLP-1 drugs could also benefit people with sleep apnea, but that’s based on anecdotal observation by clinicians and there isn’t research evidence yet to make that claim, Singh said.

He said more study is needed to see if tirzepatide could have an effect on sleep apnea among patients who don’t have obesity.

“If we can kind of like tease out what is the effect of weight loss versus what is the direct effect of these medications on the upper airway, that will be very interesting.”

The most common side effects of GLP-1 drugs, including tirzepatide, are nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and constipation. More serious but much less likely side effects include inflammation of the pancreas, bowel obstruction and gallstones.

“Whenever a patient is diagnosed to have obstructive sleep apnea, we have a discussion about risks and benefits of the various treatment options available to them. And this medication will go on that list of options when we discuss the risks and benefits,” Singh said.

Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.