The Canadian Dental Care Plan (CDCP) is a new dental coverage plan for people living on low incomes across Canada. It is the next step in ensuring that all Canadians have at least some level of coverage for basic dental care.
ISAC staff have developed a Backgrounder document that includes information on relevant legislation that governs the CDCP, eligibility criteria, application timelines and processes, how the CDCP interacts with other dental benefits, the CDCP coverage scheme, and included dental services.
The Backgrounder also includes an analysis of various components of the CDCP through a critical income security lens. The Backgrounder presents current concerns with the new Plan and how the CDCP will impact low-income communities. Consistent with this analysis, the final section of the Backgrounder includes a set of recommendations to improve the CDCP for low-income recipients, particularly regarding eligibility criteria, coordination with other dental benefits, appeal processes, additional fees and out-of-pocket expenses, and potential coverage restrictions.
You can scroll through the Backgrounder below or you can download the English PDF version by clicking here. A minimally formatted Word version can be downloaded by clicking here (download will automatically start).
La version française est ici (PDF).
Note: This Plan is different from the Canada Dental Benefit which came out in 2022, and which was an interim benefit for children under 12 whose families met a specific set of criteria. That benefit is being phased out, with the permanent CDCP acting as a replacement.
ISAC staff is grateful to Abby Taher for all of her work on this Benefit Backgrounder.