Catenaa, Wednesday, November 26, 2025- Deloitte is under renewed scrutiny after a $1.6 million health care report prepared for Newfoundland and Labrador was found to contain faulty citations and references to academic work that does not exist, according to an investigation by the Independent.
The 526-page report, released in May, advised the province on virtual care, staffing pressures, and post-pandemic impacts across the health sector.
The disclosure follows similar issues in Australia, where Deloitte which has reportedly used AI models for the work, was required to reimburse part of a government contract after incorrect citations surfaced in a welfare report produced earlier this year.
The probe found that several citations in the document traced back to fabricated studies.
Some real researchers were listed as authors of papers they never wrote, while others were paired with coauthors they had never worked with.
One cited paper from the Canadian Journal of Respiratory Therapy could not be located in the journal’s database.
Deloitte said it stands by the report’s conclusions. The firm stated it is correcting a small number of citations and said those changes do not alter the findings.
It also confirmed that AI tools were used to assist research tasks tied to a limited set of references, but not to draft the report itself.
The findings have raised concerns inside Canada’s academic and health communities as the province continues to face shortages of nurses and doctors.
The report remains posted on the provincial government’s website, and officials have not issued public statements addressing the errors.
No refund has been announced in Canada.
