Alexander Mathias Munter (born April 29, 1968) is the President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO), and a former elected official and business owner in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
Advocacy
Throughout his career, Munter has been at the forefront of numerous social change initiatives.
In 2001, as head of the city of Ottawa's Health and Social Services Committee, he led the adoption of Canada's first big-city workplace and public place smoking ban on city council. The Ottawa by-law became a model for many other jurisdictions, including New York City, which invited Munter to present to its city health commission in 2002. While second-hand smoke prohibitions are now commonplace, Ottawa's regulations broke new ground and came only a few years after Toronto had been forced to repeal a similar by-law due to public protest.
In 2003, Munter was approached by Canadians for Equal Marriage, a coalition of churches, professional groups and citizen organizations, and was asked to be the group's National Co-ordinator. In that role, he led a successful national campaign in support of Bill C-38: Civil Marriage Act, the federal legislation to entrench same-sex marriage rights in Canadian law.
In October 2011, Munter was named the next CEO of the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario] (CHEO) replacing Michel Bilodeau who retired from CHEO after a 30-year career in health administration.
Since moving into health and social services administration in 2007, Munter has continued to be a national voice on important public policy issues like gene patenting, obesity, mental health and the future of health care.
In 2014, Munter spoke for the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) when the organization launched a lawsuit against a private company, Transgenomic, challenging the legality of gene patents in Federal Court in Canada. CHEO argued that genes and other segments of the human genome should not be subject to patents for commercial purposes. CHEO declared victory in 2016, when it secured the right to use the disputed genes for all public hospitals and non-profit labs and created a public access framework that could be replicated for other genes. Munter called it "a historic day for Canada and Canada's health care system."
In 2012, Munter was appointed co-chair of a provincial expert panel on childhood obesity. Its 2013 report proposed a three-pronged strategy to reduce rates of childhood obesity: putting kids on the path to lifelong health, changing the food environment and building healthier communities. Recommendations included baby-friendly hospitals, better support for breastfeeding and restrictions on the marketing of junk food to children.
Munter has also been a vocal advocate of improved access to mental health care and to champion the adoption of innovative technologies within Canadian hospitals, as well as is a frequent speaker on the future of Canada's universal medicare system.
Career
Munter's father emigrated from Germany to Montreal in 1966, his mother had arrived the year before. They met in a French class for immigrants, which his mother was teaching. His family then moved to the Ottawa region in 1977, and settled in the Katimavik-Hazeldean area west of the city. At age 14, Munter began publishing the Kanata Kourier from his basement as a monthly local paper for the suburban community of Kanata, Ontario. In four years, the paper had a staff of seven and a circulation of 10,000 in the town of 27,000. In recognition of his success in business, he received an award as "Young Entrepreneur of the Year" from then-Prime Minister Brian Mulroney in 1988.
Munter was a City and Regional Councillor in Ottawa from 1991 to 2003. From 1997 onward, he headed the council committees responsible for health and social services with oversight of the city's $550 million human services budget. In that role, he led Council to adopt unanimously pioneering smoke-free regulations in 2001; helped open new child care centres, expand the number of child care spaces, and expand public health programs for children and youth; worked with provincial government to oversee the transfer of ambulance services and social housing to the municipal level; initiated Canada's first comprehensive public access defibrillator program; expanded long-term care for seniors; funded hospital expansions and worked with the Community Care Access Centre and community support agencies to improve at-home support services for seniors and people with disabilities.