The Newfoundland and Labrador Medical Association says this province’s ability to attract physicians is “about to get a lot more challenging.”

NLMA President Dr. Susan MacDonald was responding to plans announced by the new Nova Scotia government to spend more than $55-million to improve physician recruitment in that province.

MacDonald wants to know how Newfoundland and Labrador could possibly compete with a Nova Scotia government which she says is showing innovation and courage when tackling their family medicine shortage.

She says Nova Scotia recognizes there is a shortage of doctors that has led to problems with access to health care, while Newfoundland and Labrador’s Minister of Health “refuses to acknowledge there is a problem” with “no plan to address it.”

She accuses Minister John Haggie of presiding over the breakdown of family medicine in this province.