They had to navigate the health-care system growing up. Now they’re students at Canada’s newest med school – CTV
September 03, 2025
TORONTO — Toronto Metropolitan University opened Canada’s newest medical school this week, with 94 students who administrators believe reflect the diversity needed among this country’s future doctors.
“It’s very intentional for us to be locating the school in Brampton — a diverse community, underserved from a medical human resources standpoint,” said Dr. Dominick Shelton, interim assistant dean and an emergency physician at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto.
The University of Prince Edward Island also welcomed its first medical students this week as a regional campus of Newfoundland and Labrador’s existing program at Memorial University. York University in Toronto and Simon Fraser University in Surrey, B.C., will also open new medical schools in the coming years.
Shelton hopes these new schools will help solve the shortage of primary-care physicians in Canada.
“We are going to be showing our students the joy of practising family medicine,” he said, noting that TMU is establishing an integrated health centre in the community.
Four students in TMU’s inaugural class shared what inspired them to become doctors and the barriers they overcame to get here.
