Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Following up on my Member's statement, can the Minister confirm how many -- sorry, my questions are for the Minister of health.
Can the Minister confirm how many NWT residents are currently registered for the new extended health benefits, and can she provide a regional breakdown by income band of all approved applicants, both seniors and non-seniors, so Members can see where there may be pockets of residents that may need additional support to register. Thank you.
Thank you, Member from Inuvik Boot Lake. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as of the end of April, we have 894 non-senior residents approved. We have 3,671 seniors approved. Of those non-senior -- oh, yes, 461 were formally on the specific -- specified disease condition program. So right now, we have 433 brand new registrants. What I can do is get our enrolment database to record -- I mean, they do record the clients' region so I can share that information with the Member once we have all of that information compiled. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister for that. And we'll get into the financial impacts of that maybe another day. But so I understand that seniors are automatically renewed, but other beneficiaries must reapply every year. What reminder systems or supports are in place to ensure that non-senior residents re-register on time so that they do not experience an interruption in their coverage, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate this question, yes, and non-seniors, because there is no income threshold on -- or sorry, seniors, there's no income threshold so those just automatically renew every year. Because the extended health program is based on income, there is an annual CRA that needs to be added to their application. However, I've directed my department to put in clearer processes as this -- you know, we're hearing this, that there's vacancies -- or there's gaps in people that are applying. So we'll take that back, and we'll look at how we can streamline that process better or to ensure that the information is getting out soon enough to NWT residents so that they apply early enough. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Final supplementary. Member from Inuvik Boot Lake.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Minister. And I think that's crucial. It was alarming, the number of people that weren't aware they had to register for the program. So I'm glad to hear that, and we'll keep an eye on that as we move forward.
Mr. Speaker, as part of the work to modernize the medical travel, has the Minister given any consideration to folding the medical travel policy, if possible, into the extended health benefits framework. Is that something that's do-able and something she's considering? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as the Member has said, we are modernizing the medical travel, and we will be reviewing the extended health benefits in this next few -- like, I think it's one year from the time, so we'll start the review in September. And, yes, the medical travel benefits were applied across the board for those specific disease, but now that's been removed and they have to use the medical travel policy. So there is lots of different pieces going on. But with the review of the medical travel modernization, I believe that this has -- we will -- like, I have flagged this because it has come up to. So we'll continue to work with the department to provide some model options so that we can bring that forward. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister of Health and Social Services. Oral questions. Member from Monfwi.
