Emergency department waits

Seventy Thousand New Brunswickers rely on Emergency Departments for basic primary care?

​The Emergency Department is a poor substitute for well-organized Primary Care.  So in this province that has the highest ratio of physicians to population in Canada, why do seventy thousand persons use the Emergency Department as their regular source of medical care (NB Health Council Report on Access, 2017)?
Recently physicians in Fredericton and Saint John expressed their concerns about the over-crowding and backlogs in hospital emergency departments, as they should.  Health Minister Ted Flemming responded on Friday, May 17, 2019 that he thinks there are options not yet explored in order to resolve the issues.  Read more here