Empowering pharmacists for healthier futures: Momentum continues across Canada
September 25 is World Pharmacists Day and this year’s theme, “Empowering pharmacists for healthier futures,” highlights the importance of enabling pharmacists to contribute fully to patient care and stronger health systems. In Canada, CPhA’s Pharmacists CAN campaign is helping advance that vision by advocating for pharmacists to be fully authorized to provide the care they are educated and trained to deliver.
As health-care needs continue to evolve, pharmacists are playing an increasingly important role in prevention, access to care, medication management and the delivery of primary care services in communities around the world.
For World Pharmacists Day 2026, the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP) is calling attention to the conditions that enable pharmacists to make their greatest contribution—including supportive legislation, sustainable funding and remuneration, integration into health systems, education and greater public awareness of pharmacists’ expertise.
Here in Canada, that message closely aligns with a conversation that has been gaining momentum: pharmacists are educated and trained to provide a broad range of health-care services, but what they are authorized to provide still varies significantly depending on where they practise.
Pharmacists CAN: trained and trusted to help
That reality is at the heart of CPhA’s Pharmacists CAN campaign.
The campaign highlights how pharmacists’ ability to provide services such as assessing and treating common conditions, administering vaccines, managing medications and supporting chronic disease care, still varies across Canada. Through Pharmacists CAN, CPhA is advocating for pharmacists to provide the care they are educated and trained to deliver, helping improve access to primary care and make better use of the health-care workforce.
A snapshot of pharmacy practice in 2026
This year alone has brought a number of developments expanding or advancing pharmacist care across Canada. Just some of the changes include:
- Prince Edward Island (February): Pharmacy Plus PEI expanded to include strep throat testing and treatment at participating community pharmacies.
- Saskatchewan: In May, a new three-year pharmacy agreement included further expansion of strep throat and ear infection services, along with commitments to support minor ailment prescribing and chronic disease management, followed by the expansion of strep and ear infection services to more than 100 pharmacies in September.
- Ontario (July): Pharmacists gained authority to assess and prescribe for nine additional common ailments and administer six additional publicly funded vaccines for eligible Ontarians.
- Manitoba (August): Pharmacists who complete approved training can now assess, prescribe and administer eligible contraceptives.
- Northwest Territories: Proposed regulations would expand pharmacists’ scope to include initiating and adapting prescriptions, ordering and interpreting tests, and administering vaccines and other medications.
Snapshot of the impact: And there is growing evidence of what enabling pharmacists to provide more care can mean for the broader health system. For example, new research in Nova Scotia found that emergency department visits for tick bites fell by roughly 50% after pharmacists were authorized to prescribe preventive Lyme disease treatment.
What access to pharmacist care can mean for patients
Behind changes in scope and policy are the experiences of patients themselves. Messages recently shared with CPhA offer a glimpse of what pharmacist care can mean in practice:
In the small community of St. Charles, Ontario, Phil B. described his pharmacist as an important source of health care:
“Hazem has brought a much needed medical service to our small, underserviced community… Our pharmacist provides a much needed component of health care that includes health advice, blood pressure/blood glucose monitoring advice, diagnosis and prescription as permitted in Ontario (which should be expanded).”
In Ucluelet, British Columbia, Katherine C. spoke about the importance of having a pharmacist available when other health-care options can be limited:
“We don’t have a lot of health-care options sometimes. We can count on him to help and offer the best support and advice. He is genuine and such an amazing asset to our community.”
And for Bonnie O. in Inverary, Ontario, expanded pharmacist prescribing meant being able to get treatment for a urinary tract infection on a weekend:
“On a weekend I was suffering with a UTI and he did not hesitate to help, asking all the right questions and prescribing the correct medication. In less than 12 hours I was feeling so much better.”
Empowering pharmacists for the future
World Pharmacists Day is an opportunity to recognize the contributions pharmacists make every day—and this year’s theme also highlights the systems and policies that determine how fully their expertise can be used. While 2026 has already brought important progress across Canada, significant differences in pharmacists’ scope of practice remain between provinces and territories.
CPhA’s Pharmacists CAN campaign advocates for pharmacists to be enabled to provide the care they are educated and trained to deliver, wherever they practise in Canada.
Learn more about Pharmacists CAN and what pharmacists are trained to do at PharmacistsCAN.ca.