As the son of a refugee, Dr. Andrew Boozary was imparted with values of social justice and fairness from an early age.
By: Marielle Boutin
Dr. Boozary’s father, a doctor who immigrated to Canada as an Iranian refugee, and his mother, a human rights lawyer, provided an environment of open dialogue surrounding equity and advocacy, ensuring the topics were central to their home. This focus has since shaped much of what Dr. Boozary does and how he views the world.
A primary care physician, policy expert, researcher, and founding executive director of the Gattuso Centre for Social Medicine at UHN, Dr. Boozary has established himself as a fierce advocate for marginalized populations. He is also a recognized faculty member at IHPME.
Dr. Boozary considers the homelessness crisis to be among the most pressing challenges facing Toronto and has committed his work to tackling it through a healthcare lens, leading to the establishment of Dunn House, the first-ever social medicine supportive housing initiative in Canada.
Launched in 2024 – a partnership between the City of Toronto, the Gattuso Centre, and the United Way of Greater of Toronto – Dunn House is a four-story, 51-unit building that supports people transitioning out of homelessness, with a focus on frequent emergency care users.
The building features amenities such as shared laundry, a communal kitchen, as well as dining areas and space for socialization. Residents can also access health support, including an on-site nurse, psychiatrist, and a 24/7 virtual emergency room linked to UHN. Dr. Boozary is also regularly present at Dunn House as a primary care physician.
According to Dr. Boozary, there is a strong link between housing and health, with homelessness often leading to poorer health outcomes.
“The reality we’re talking about is that there are groups and large segments of the population that have been completely excluded from many of the advances in healthcare and social policy, including basic fundamentals like housing and income,” says Dr. Boozary. “Millions of people cannot access primary care, exposing societal fault lines that were highlighted during the pandemic. These inequalities are worsening.”
Dunn House was born from the need for integrated care and evidence-based, compassionate solutions, which Dr. Boozary argues are essential for creating a more sustainable healthcare system.
“To create a more humanistic health system, we must act differently and partner to address these issues upstream. The housing crisis is fundamentally a health issue.”
While the establishment of Dunn House has been met with enthusiasm, the 51 units is overshadowed by the city’s 11,000+ homeless population, reinforcing the need for more sustainable solutions.
To address this, the Dunn House model is expanding beyond the walls of its Parkdale location into existing housing across the city.
Following the announcement of a $2-million expansion project, a collaborative effort between UHN and LOFT Community Services, the team behind the supportive house initiative will be bringing the same supports found in Dunn House to existing Toronto housing where these services are not currently available.
Care will be extended to patients who regularly rely on the ER for complex health issues. City data will help inform which patients should be prioritized, with a particular focus on those experiencing long-term homelessness.
Although Canada is known for its comprehensive healthcare model, the prolonged systemic neglect of marginalized individuals, demonstrated by the ongoing challenges of homelessness, reveals what Dr. Boozary describes as a mirage of universality.
“We can’t keep accepting that it’s okay to provide care for only 80% of the population and write off the remaining 20% as too challenging,” says Dr. Boozary. “If that’s our stance, we should stop claiming we have a universal health care system—because how can that be true, when millions can’t access primary care? That’s the front door to the system. And if millions can’t get through the front door, we shouldn’t keep the sign up claiming it’s universal.”
To ensure true universality and re-infuse the human condition into our healthcare system, Dr. Boozary says evidence-based, people-centered reforms are crucial, especially during a time of significant divide and polarization.
“How can we chip away at this to sustain hope with solutions that show there’s a different way to do things, without excluding or pitting anyone against each other? This has been the core of my work. How can we marry the evidence we have with the empathy needed for human dignity? Whether it’s lifting up housing solutions or creating new healthcare delivery models with community health workers and social medicine navigators.”
Dr. Boozary was recognized for this work earlier this year when he was named a 2025 Clarkson Laureate, a distinction named after Canadian journalist and former Governor General Adrienne Clarkson that celebrates leadership, integrity, and a commitment to public service in Canada.
However, he maintains that the work isn’t about individual accomplishments but a collective effort to address injustice. For him, the recognition represents a reminder to look at not only data and evidence but also at how storytelling, lived experience, and community narratives are vital to advancing health equity. He recalls watching Adrienne Clarkson on CBC with his mother as a child, seeing interviews with people from Iran—the country his family had left—and reflecting on how deeply his worldview was shaped by the stories shared.
“Part of this work isn’t just about generating data and evidence. It’s about pushing storytelling to the forefront—how do we pair data with storytelling and lived experience? How do we make sure that communities and hospitals across the city aren’t just heard, but see action? Personally, I think back to my family —the uncertainty, the fear of not knowing what would come next—but always, this sense of hope. Hope that we could build something better, not just for ourselves, but for all of us, together.”
We as a collective are facing a choice between unity or division, and according to Dr. Boozary, we must ask ourselves what kind of city, what kind of society, and what kind of country we want to be.
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Marielle Boutin
Email Address: ihpme.communications@utoronto.ca