Bringing Universal Healthcare to the Bahamas

Matt Imrie ‘15 greets me via video call from the Bahamas, brilliant blue sky and palm trees in the background. He’s currently working on a KPMG project which is advising the Bahamian government on how it can bring universal healthcare to the island nation. Matt began working on the project as part of the Toronto-based team, but was offered a chance to work on location with the local team in the Bahamas. 

Matt’s always been interested in business but a Green Industries class he took at Greenwood with Ms. McBeth helped expose him to more possibilities when it comes to business practices. “It really opened my eyes to the social and environmental side of the coin,” says Matt. “And that really helped put me on a path towards learning how you can have good business go hand-in-hand with good social and environmental impact.” After graduating from Greenwood, Matt went on to study business administration at Wilfrid Laurier while also specialising in sustainability. Overall, Matt's Greenwood experience really shaped how he carried himself, which came in handy when speaking to recruiters from KPMG and networking.

“Generally, I’m a pretty curious, nerdy kind of guy who likes to solve problems, and consulting has always been a really perfect blend of both soft and hard skills for me,” Matt says of what drew him to his consulting role. “You get to work on new and interesting challenges because typically a lot of your projects aren’t going on for five to ten years. They’re usually a bit quicker so you get to try out new and different things along the way.” 

For Matt, seeing and getting immersed in a new environment and culture is part of what excites him about travel. He also credits Greenwood’s outdoor education trips as growing his excitement to see what’s out there in the world. Before starting his role at KPMG, Matt had taken some time after graduating from Wilfrid Laurier to explore parts of Southeast Asia. His plans to explore more of Asia were put on hiatus after COVID-19 impacted international travel regulations. Now working as part of KPMG’s healthcare advising sector, he is getting a first-hand look at the people and the culture of the Bahamas to better understand how universal healthcare can be implemented and be effective. 

“The overall goal [of the project] is to roll out universal healthcare like we have here in Canada,” Matt says.”However, you have to do that in really small baby steps for multiple reasons.” Matt’s team first worked on assessing the critical services that the Bahamian government will be covering for their citizens. They identified the services that would be covered first, such as primary care, maternity healthcare and lab tests. Afterwards, the team would focus on how that coverage can expand in the coming months. Matt is currently working on including diagnostic imaging as part of the healthcare coverage the government will provide, which hopefully will be in place in the next couple of months. 

Of course, Matt’s team faces some unique considerations when it comes to applying universal healthcare to the Bahamas that makes the situation different than it is in Canada.

“Particularly, you have to build up sort of slowly because the Bahamas has zero income taxes so the government doesn’t have a lot of funding to cover all these expenses,” Matt says of one unique difference. There are also varying elements beyond just the financial aspect such as legislature and technology improvements that the consulting KPMG team needs to consider as well. “You can’t just take a cookie-cutter model of healthcare from Canada or the UK and apply it here,” Matt says. “There are really unique challenges that the islands have that you need to factor in.”

A lot of the process involves careful public consultation, adjusting strategies according to feedback and speaking with the groups that will be impacted. There are a lot of pieces to approaching this challenge, and that keeps Matt on his toes. However, the work he and his team have done to consult collaborators and community members has led to an overall 90% satisfaction rate with the public.

Matt also experienced a bit of an adjustment to approaching work and life while in the Bahamas. “There’s a classic saying that when you’re in the Caribbean islands, you’re on ‘island time’,” Matt says. “Things move more slowly - you’re kind of chilling, hanging out. There’s not really the sense of urgency or rush that there is in Toronto.” Maybe one of the most difficult things Matt had to adjust to while in the Bahamas was learning to work with the culture and stopping to take a second to focus on what’s most important. 

“Back in Canada, me and my co-workers would get so fixated on very little details and spend so much time on them,” Matt recalls. Working in the Bahamas certainly forced him to slow down and appreciate what’s around him instead of obsessing over small things.

Currently, Matt is continuing to advise and provide financial forecasts for the Bahamas as they continue to roll out more services as part of their universal healthcare coverage. As for his future travel plans, Matt hopes to resume his travel plans to Asia and finally get a chance to see cherry blossoms bloom in Japan.