Only 49% of New Brunswickers approved for the Canadian Dental Care Plan in the 2025-26 benefit year have actually received care, new federal data shows, highlighting a persistent uptake gap that extends well beyond one province and raises questions about the effectiveness of Canada's largest public insurance expansion in a generation.
Federal statistics showed 121,191 New Brunswickers were approved for the benefit year, but only 59,439 had received care as of April 30. The provincial figure sits slightly below the national average, with roughly 60% of approved CDCP members nationally having received dental care as of late 2025, according to a report from CBC.
Paul Blanchard, executive director of the New Brunswick Dental Society, said the picture was mixed. While uptake was lower than expected, the program had meaningfully improved access in many communities.
"We know from our survey that probably two-thirds of our dentists see this change as a positive, and 50 per cent of them have acknowledged that access to care in their communities has really improved," he told the publication. "There's been a lot of pent-up demand, and so people have been dealing with old dentures or partials for a long time, and they haven't had the means to come in and get this care that they need."
New Brunswick's gap reflects a combination of workforce shortages and program misunderstandings that are depressing utilization across the country.
Blanchard said 40% of the province's dentists are over the age of 50, clinics in northern New Brunswick are not accepting new patients, and 79% of survey respondents said they were advertising for a dental assistant while 70% were looking for a hygienist.
"As a patient, you can take six months, nine months to get an appointment for hygiene, and we'd certainly like to see you more frequently," he said.
Nationally, the program has struggled with similar tensions. As of April 2026, more than 4.3 million Canadians have received care under the CDCP, with total claims exceeding $6 billion, according to Health Canada.
Meanwhile, consistency and predictability around what is and is not covered continue to be problems, with some patients canceling treatment rather than navigating a lengthy appeals process when pre-authorization requests are rejected. Health Canada said that, on average, each patient has had $800 in expenses covered per year, and close to 100 per cent of active dentists, denturists and independent dental hygienists are now treating patients through the program.
A significant contributor to the uptake gap is confusion around the program's annual renewal requirements. The CDCP provides coverage over a single benefit period ending each June 30, and enrollees must reapply each year to confirm they still meet eligibility criteria. The renewal window for the 2025-26 year closed June 1.
Blanchard said many enrollees did not realize they had to reapply annually, and that people who did not receive care in the previous year likely assumed their coverage would carry forward automatically.
"What Health Canada is asking us to do is to predetermine or submit in advance to make sure that when you come in, you have coverage, so that they can avoid those things. But that does create a lot of administrative burden at the dental office," he told CBC.
Co-payment obligations have also caught some enrollees off-guard. Depending on adjusted family net income, the plan is not free, and Blanchard said a number of patients arrived expecting no out-of-pocket costs.
To be eligible, applicants must have no access to private dental insurance, an adjusted family net income below $90,000 and Canadian residency. Ontario and British Columbia lead the provinces on uptake at 59% and 56% respectively, with New Brunswick's 49 per cent placing it slightly below the national average but broadly in line with most other provinces, according to the report.
Help is on the way for New Brunswick's supply-side constraints, at least in part.
From September, five students from the province will enter Dalhousie University's dental program each year for at least the next five years, following the restoration of funding for those seats. There are also three seats for New Brunswick students at Universite de Montreal and two at Universite Laval.
The CDCP's rollout offers a large-scale case study in the challenges of launching a complex public benefits program at national scale.
Workforce capacity constraints, enrollee confusion over policy terms, inconsistent coverage decisions and administrative friction at the point of claim are combining to suppress utilization well below the program's theoretical reach, CBC reported.
