Is the good health of health and social service workers a priority?
The report published by the Ministry of Health and Social Servicesi, dated December 27, 2025, indicates that 26,964 employees of the network are on sick leave due to disability (CNESST or other agencies).
Using an average annual salary of $68,000, this represents more than $1.8 billion in costs related to this high level of disability-related work stoppages, not considering the care and services that are not provided to the population.
This corresponds to 2,634 more employees on sick leave since the creation of Santé Québec, an increase of 10.83% in one year. Disability-related absences now affect 7.8% of workers in the network, nearly double the Quebec average of 4.3%, according to the inactivity rate related to illness or disability published by Statistics Canada for the year 2024ii.
Meanwhile, the site also indicates a reduction of 2,746 people employed by Santé Québec over the same one-year period.
It is sad to note that, despite the mission of the health and social services network to take care of the population, when it comes to taking care of its own employees, Santé Québec cuts a poor figure. This is the perfect illustration of the theory of the poorly shod shoemaker.
It is all the more surprising to hear the CEO of Santé Québec, Ms. Geneviève Biron, say on the program Le Bilan, on January 12, 2026 on LCN,iii that the situation is « stable », « under control » and that there is « no dramatic rise », when the figures clearly show the opposite.
In total, there are about 5,300 fewer employees serving a constantly growing Quebec population. If Santé Québec’s management remains in denial and nothing is done quickly to curb this vicious circle, the situation is likely to worsen in the coming months and years.
When the work overload becomes unsustainable due to chronic staff shortages, it is not an aggressive management of absenteeism, neither by the attendance department nor by the human resources department, that will solve the problem. Instead, we need to hire more personnel, with better working conditions, reduce the overwork, and recognize the importance of the workers’ physical and mental health, by making prevention an operational priority.
Patrick Hallé
ii Table 14-10-0390-01 Absence from work among full-time employees, annual, not in the labour force DOI : https://doi.org/10.25318/1410039001-fra