10 Myths About Canadian Health Care, Busted | Arthritis Information

I came across this informative essay which was written by a person with duel citizenship who routinely uses both healthcare systems, and since I have many times encountered these misconceptions here I thought it might be useful to post it for those lobbying for healthcare reform in the US, those that like to be factually informed, and the curious.

10 myths about Canadian Healthcare
http://www.pnhp.org/news/2008/february/10_myths_about_canad.php

And part 2

http://www.pnhp.org/news/2008/february/mythbusting_canadian.php

Edited to add link to part 2Gimpy-a-gogo2008-03-04 13:01:39Gimpy, would you seriously consider this to be an unbiased account without spin? I'd like to hear the "other side" respond. Bet it's a whole nuther story.Well, this person is obviously VERY pro-universal healthcare, but that doesn't mean any of the facts are false. What parts of it do you think are inaccurate?

Two questions: Can someone who doesn't have insurance in America really give an accurate picture of what goes on within that system? I have insurance that works well for me overall, with very few limits on what I can get in a timely manner. I'm happy with our healthcare system.

Why does he come over the America on a regular basis for health care if the Canadian system is so great? Does he get that many MRIs?

I'm not going to try and convince anyone that our system is flawless. It most certainly needs help. But I'm not sure the Canadian system is what we need either. It may be somewhere between the two to ensure everyone has access to health care.

I got the impression they live part time in the US.

So, other than trying to discredit the author on various grounds, what parts of this do you think are inaccurate?

Their's two side to every story Gimpy. The essay you posted was pro "social" medicine. I'd like to hear from people who are against it and why.

I did have the same Q Jesse did, I mean why ask an uninsured American but not an insured American? I also think that the idea that when Canadians complain about health care, it's really just for sport, seems hard to believe.

If you read the essay, the author never once discusses her own experiences with either healthcare system, so I'm not sure why the fact she is uninsured in the US is such a point of issue. Are insured Americans the only ones whos research counts? She wrote about a bunch of facts, debunking inaccurate things oft cited by people on the "other side" of the story. You're certainly welcome to post a rebuttal, yours or anyone elses, but just saying "well, it's the OTHER side" isn't a rebuttal.

What parts of the essay do you think are inaccurate or misleading? You obviously think there are some misleading or inaccurate parts so what are they? What is the "spin" you speak of?

[QUOTE=Linncn]

I did have the same Q Jesse did, I mean why ask an uninsured American but not an insured American? [/QUOTE]

Because they're the majority? Aren't there more of them then there are of us? Isn't that the trend anyway? I think it's more common NOT to have insurance, as people either A. can't afford it or B. can't get it due to a pre-exsisting illness.

(Why do I have a feeling I'm going to be sorry for getting in on this.....lol)

I just found a short bio on the author and it said she lived in California for 20 years and now lives in Vancouver (hey! My town!) so that would explain using both healthcare systems. The majority Katie???No Gimpy, insurend americans aren't the only ones whose research counts, but they do often have a different point of view which deserves equal time. The author of the essay does not talk about her experience, but she does make clear where she stands on the issue. That's fine. Why should it bother you Gimpy, that I'd like to hear from the other side too? You seem offended by that as though the mear suggestion that their is another reasonable veiwpoint is an accusation.Link, you ARE the other side. What are you looking for here? I'm not at all bothered that you want to hear from the "other side". In fact, I have asked in each and every post in this thread (not counting the original one) what that rebuttal would be.

I am bothered by the often used stance of "this author does not argue from the side of the agenda I am on, so therefore what they say is discredited." This author wrote this article to counter the often cited (by people on the "other side") inaccuracies of how Canadian healthcare works; inaccuracies I have often heard put forward on this forum. Obviously, this author is pro-single payer health insurance, so to say that because she's not arguing for the staus-quo discredits her is completely ludicrous as a rebuttal.

This author has had the experience of living in both countries. The author does not speak of her personal experiences. She quotes verifiable statistics and facts in many cases.

So, what things that she wrote do you think are inaccurate?
Gimpy-a-gogo2008-03-04 15:46:30Katie last estimate is that 40 million Americans are uninsured which means over 260 million have insurance. The insured are by far and away the majority. I don't have medical insurance and live in America.

It is a "horrible" pain. All our extra money goes to medical, but it is far cheaper than trying to get insurance and paying the monthly. I have been quoted time and time again over 0 a month for us to get insurance. I can't afford that.

So, I pay cash. If i get an infection, i usually wait until i have the money and then get it taken care of. I use credit cards some times to pay for RA appointments because I need to have the liver tests and stuff monthly.

I have chronic bacterial vaginosis, so i have to go to the doctor for appointments throughout the year.

Luckily for me, i live in a small town that has a hospital that is a training hospital. Sometimes it's a bad thing cuz they are in training, but due to my income, i don't have to pay to see the obgyn. But, i have to pay cash for family doctor and RA doctor because the RA isn't at the hospital and in order to get an appointmetn to the family doctor at the hospital i have to wait months, i pay cash at another so i can get in the next day.

We spend thousands a year for treatment for me and it does hurt financially cuz it still isn't enough to get a good tax cut.

I can't get medical besides the 0 or more a month so i basicly am screwed.

But, for medications like humira, there are companies here in the us that sponsor you and pay the fees if you have income like mine.

gimpy that was interesting information. I would just find the articles more powerful if they had been written by someone who did not have an agenda. The author is for universal healthcare therefore his spin is towards all the positives in that system.

And believe it or not I do believe there is good in the Canadian system. But as the US looks towards changing our healthcare system and we look towards other countries we must have a clear and unbiased assessment of the good and bad of each system. Then we have to figure out if the models from other much smaller countries is translatable into our large highly diverse 300 mil person population.

We certainly want to fix what is wrong with the system, and that is essentially the underinsured and uninsured working poor, but we don't want to mess up what is good about the US system..and as much as many complain there is an awful lot of good

buckeye2008-03-04 15:59:50Well, that's a good point Katie. hehehe

Gimpy here's the thing. You don't hear the other side, it's been given a zillion times. You've already made up your mind that one is good and one is evil. To be fair, I've made up my mind too. Neither one of us is gonna flip, so I'm calling it a day on ths topic. Probably won't stick to it next time it comes up, but for now I don't feel like arguing.

Oh. Haha Okay I'm not sure why I thought it was the other way around....sorry!!Without going into hours and hours of research with regard to the article, I can't say with any authority how much is fact and how much is spin. It's just very hard to ignore the countless times I have heard of horrendous waiting times for surgery, appointments, etc. in Canada.

This topic has come up so many times in this forum and nothing ever gets accomplished except that anger flares. We have enough "flares" around here without adding to it. I will agree to disagree until I have more unbiased evidence that your system is superior. I will not waste my time trying to convince you that our system is. I will admit that our system is flawed, as is yours. Neither is perfect and I don't want to swap one problem for another. Without question, we need to make sure all Americans have access to health care. I'm just not totally convinced that Canada's way is the best way for us and our much-larger population.

It's just not that important to me that you believe our system is a good one. I don't know why it's so important to you to convince us that yours is. Somehow I don't think you really care about us that much.

Jesse882008-03-04 16:07:37Well, I didn't post that article to say your healthcare is bad. I posted it because I often read people posting things like in Canada you don't get to pick your own doctors and other completely false statements about our healthcare, many of which were covered by the article. Regardless of whether the author has an agenda you can agree with or not, unless you can discredit the facts she presents I think they are worthwhile to keep in mind when debating healthcare system reform.

I actually care about people regardless of their country of origin and I get upset when I read stories on this forum of people being denied medications by their insurance company, or people not getting the healthcare they need because of bad luck or social condition. Every other first world country on the globe has universal healthcare. They can't all be wrong, can they?

I just think when people debate the issue they should have the facts, not a bunch of untrue scare mongering myths, so when I came across this article I decided to post it because it covered a lot of the untruths I have seen posted on this and other forums. If any of it is innacurate or untrue I am not aware of it, but if I were shown it to be untrue I would certainly be open to changing my mind about that particular fact.

But so far no one has even discussed any of the things presented in the article.
The problem with those articles are that they are totally opinion. Everyone wants healthcare for everyone and most can get health care. I know alot of people cry-cry and boo-hoo when they should get better educated and get better employment that covers insurance rather than proclaiming, I love my job. I don't think anyone is not going to cry if your tax base is raised to that of canadas. I think that even in canada, to have "better" insurance, you have to pay even more. If you think that canadiens are paying alot of their monies for taxes now, wait for two years when all of these large american companies pull out as they are starting to now.

Gimpy, in another thread you asked why I posted a link to www.notcanada.com. You claimed that I always turned everything into a USvsCanada deal. I meant to explain but got carried away with other not very important things. I posted that because you keep your eyes wide open for problems within the united states. You keep your search engines at full speed looking for dirt from and for the united states. I just thought that if i turned your eyes to some of the problems within your own country you would be willing to spend some of that "worry about the united states and it's troubles" time helping your country with your troubles. Just trying to help a neighbor.

Anyway, here is a differring opinion, for what it's worth:

Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, Inc.

1601 N. Tucson Blvd. Suite 9, Tucson, AZ 85716

(800) 635-1196, FAX (520) 325-4230, www.aapsonline.org

Why the United States Should Reject Socialized Medicine (a.k.a. "Single Payer") and Restore Private Medicine

In August, 2003, Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP) announced with great fanfare that some 8,000 physicians and medical students have endorsed a Proposal by the Physicians’ Working Group for Single-Payer National Health Insurance. This was published in JAMA, along with two favorable editorials, although the AMA is officially opposed to a "single-payer" system.

This is the latest effort in a long march toward socialized medicine that began with President Truman more than five decades ago. Incremental steps have brought huge cost increases, burgeoning numbers of uninsured patients, a proliferation of bureaucratic rules and draconian criminal penalties, a deterioration in the quality of care, physician demoralization, patient anger, and dire predictions of impending bankruptcy of federal entitlement programs.

Small steps toward the goal having had so many adverse side effects, a "great leap forward" is now proposed to enact the program once and for all-no going back. The current problems in American medicine are not attributed to past actions, but rather to stopping short of the goal of forcing all Americans into a single, uniform program.

Perhaps the advocates for this "giant leap" have forgotten the origin of the phrase "Great Leap Forward": the 1958-1960 fiasco launched by Mao Zedong, which resulted in from 10 to 30 million deaths from starvation in China.

We should certainly take the basic precaution of looking before we leap.

What the PNHP Program Would Do

Cover all Americans for "comprehensive" services, including long-term care, mental health, dental services, and prescription drugs and supplies. The cost of insuring some of these risks is so high that most Americans can’t afford the premiums.

Set up boards of expert and community representatives to decide what services to exclude because they are "unnecessary" or "ineffective." Their word will be law.

Proscribe private coverage of all items covered by the public program (as Medicare does) and forbid doctors to bill patients directly for any covered service or for costly office-based equipment such as MRI scanners, even if the public program refuses to provide the service.

Eliminate all copayments and deductibles and thus all barriers to overuse.

Prevent individuals from buying better care than is available to all ("eliminate disparities").

Create a government monopsony, forbidding other sources of payment, or cost accounting systems that could attribute charges to individual patients.

Put all hospitals on a global budget-a fixed income that must cover everything.

Forbid hospitals to use any part of their operating budget to make major capital purchases.

Force all HMOs and group practices to convert to "non-profit" status.

Subject physicians paid by fee for service to price controls.

Impose other methods of "cost containment" on fee-for-service physicians, including: limiting the supply of physicians; monitoring for "extreme" practice patterns; limits on regional spending for physician services that force physicians to "police" themselves; and capping individual physician earnings.

Forbid major capital projects funded by private donations unless approved by the health planning board, if such projects would entail future operating expenses.

Establish a national formulary and require use of the lowest cost "therapeutically equivalent" product with exceptions for "medical necessity."

Force pharmaceutical companies to lower prices.

Limit total health expenditures to the same proportion of the GNP as in the year prior to enactment-apparently regardless of demographic changes, epidemics, or new discoveries.

Fund the program through taxes, "the least cumbersome and least expensive mechanism for collecting money," preferably a progressive income tax.

PNHP Principles-Translated

PNHP states that four principles shape its vision of reform.

First: "Access to comprehensive health care is a human right"-that government must enforce. The corollaries are that patients have no right to the care of their choice, but only to that which government deems necessary and effective. Patients have no right to spend their own money to improve the "necessary" care that they receive, but only to buy such items as cosmetic surgery. Patients have no right to economize on medical services or to benefit from their own good health but must pay for the care of spendthrifts with poor health habits.

Second: "The right to choose one’s physician…is fundamental to patient autonomy." This choice, however, must be from the "licensed health care professionals" permitted by government, with the above constraints on supply and capped expenditures.

Third: "Pursuit of corporate profit and personal fortune have no place in caregiving." Physicians can increase their income-up to a certain limit-only by "working harder" and following the government rules, not by investing in superior equipment or facilities, enhancing their skills, developing better methods, or satisfying patients better.

Fourth: "In a democracy, the public should set overall health policies and budgets. Personal medical decisions must be made by patients with their caregivers, not by corporate or government bureaucrats." The only possible operational meaning of "the public" is government bureaucrats and boards, which rigidly restrict the range of personal medical decisions. Patients are disenfranchised and dependent when they cannot use the power that consumers have in every other sphere of life: the choice of how (and whether) to spend their own money.

PNHP Assumptions Contrary to Evidence

Underlying the PNHP argument are a number of unstated assumptions, which are unproved or demonstrably false.

The ban on patient payment will assure quality by sealing the escape hatches.

The affluent, in PNHP’s view, can be relied upon to lobby for increasing their own high taxes to fund care for people who pay little or nothing in taxes-if and only if they are stuck in the same public system as the poor. Equal misery is mandated to avoid a "multi-tiered system."

So far, this theory hasn’t worked. Instead of lobbying, sick Canadians travel south to buy care in the United States-including Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, who threatened to cut off federal funding to Alberta if clinics there dared to bill privately. A one-world socialist regime would be required to prevent an off-shore exodus, but the Soviet solution of special stores and hospitals for the Nomenklatura could develop in that circumstance.

A savings of 0 billion, enough to cover all the uninsured, will result from abolishing private insurance with its profits and administrative overhead.

It is asserted that administration by the public sector is much more efficient, with Medicare spending only 2 to 3 percent for this purpose.

This estimate is highly misleading, for it disregards many costs such as tax collection and compliance, lobbying, and the administrative burdens shifted onto physicians, hospitals, and others. A 1994 study for the Council for Affordable Health Insurance showed that when hidden costs are considered, the administrative overhead of public programs is .27 per dollar of benefits, compared to .16 for private insurance-69 percent more. Moreover, government accounting is even more dishonest than Enron’s. Internal controls are so poor that the Government Accounting Office has been unable to render an opinion on consolidated government financial statements. But whatever the overhead percentage is, it will apply to all medical expenditures. If most small medical bills were paid directly by patients, there would be zero third-party overhead for most expenditures.

PNHP’s estimates of the cost savings from importing Canadian-style administration, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, were criticized in the same issue. A more realistic method, which PNHP spokesmen had used in the past, reduced the hypothetical savings by billion. An analysis by Patricia Danzon calculated that, with all costs included, the overhead of the Canadian system is 45 percent of claims.

However, even if 0 billion in savings were realized, it would be immediately used up by eliminating out-of-pocket costs for Medicare beneficiaries. Today’s seniors pay 50 percent of their medical costs out of pocket.

Incentives for skimping on care and avoiding sick patients will be removed.

Capitation will still exist; however, there will be no prodding from profit-minded managed-care bureaucrats-only policing by central planners and by others who must share the single global budget. The magic will supposedly be worked by eliminating the profit motive, or at least the ability to earn a profit or to keep any savings from the global budget.

Throughout human history, private profits have been the only incentive that has brought progress and prosperity. PNHP would repeat past disastrous experiments by trying to substitute peer pressure and government compulsion. Self interest has always emerged-in buying influence and exploiting the system rather than in productive activity.

In the absence of the engine of the profit motive, and of voluntary transactions in which both buyer and seller benefit, an enterprise becomes a zero-sum game. A gain for one is always a loss to another: a prescription for the war of all against all.

Such a system cannot work for the advantage of the weak or the sick. The Canadian system is notorious for skimping on patient care, with possibly 150,000 patients waiting for needed care. The primary focus is on budget, not patients, who are a very small proportion of an official’s constituency.

Single Payer = Insurance = Healthcare.

As PNHP admits, certain types of "insurance" such as HMOs often serve as barriers to medical care. Global budgets, price controls, and other bureaucratic impediments will be an even more effective barrier. Add to this the overutilization that inevitably occurs with the removal of any payment obligation of patients, and the result is certain: long waiting lists, constantly overstressed facilities and personnel, and patients spending days on gurneys in emergency rooms. Apparently admitting that waiting lists are permanent, Canada is establishing a new bureaucracy for better "management" of the waits. The Western Canada Waiting List Project (www.wcwl.org) seeks to define terms and develop objective priorities.

PNHP does not admit that "single-payer" is not insurance. It is a collectivized government payment system on the socialist principle of "from each according to his means, and to each according to his need." In contrast, true insurance reimburses subscribers for a catastrophic financial loss, with premiums determined by risk. Not all medical needs can be "covered" by insurance; attempts to do so simply destroy the insurance mechanism. Charity and social welfare are ways to meet those needs. Neither should be called "insurance."

The U.S. has plenty of money to finance the system.

PNHP expects to have the same amount of money spent on medical care as under the present system; it simply wants the government to control and redistribute the money. The model of efficiency, economy, and integrity is Medicare^{1-even though Medicare expenditures in the tenth year of the program exceeded initial estimates by a factor of more than six. PNHP does not acknowledge or account for the cost shifting to the private sector that results from Medicare price controls.}

The PNHP Proposal also fails to acknowledge the unfunded liabilities of existing entitlement programs that realistically can never be paid. Before adding on a prescription drug benefit, promised Medicare benefits already exceed projected revenues by .9 trillion over the next 75 years, or trillion if current tax and spending policies are projected over all future years.

The Canadian per capita debt is already double that of the United States.13

Advocates of socialism tend to assume that increases in the public sector have no effect on the economy as a whole. In fact, as incentives to growth are taxed away, the economy stagnates. Government outlays as a percentage of GDP have a strong inverse correlation with real GDP growth. Some examples:

Govt outlays Real GDP

as % of GDP Growth

^Ireland	^34.4	^3.2
^U.S.	^35.6	^2.5
^U.K.	^40.9	^2.1
^Germany	^48.6	^0.3
^France	^54.0	^1.2

^{The health of Americans would improve under a socialized system.
Prepayment for services (third-party payment) does increase utilization-of both beneficial and inappropriate services. The only randomized study of the benefits of health insurance ever performed in the U.S., by the RAND Corporation in the 1970s, showed a negligible effect on health outcomes, even though those who paid nothing at the time of service used 40 percent more services than those who had to pay up to ,000 out of pocket.
It is frequently asserted that nations with socialized medicine have better health indicators, particularly infant mortality. Such comparisons are misleading. The populations being compared may be very different; a homogeneous Scandinavian population may be compared to a population with a high proportion of ethnic minorities and members of a drug-abusing underclass, who have a much greater risk of delivering low birth-weight babies. Moreover, the criteria for how long a baby has to live to be counted as a live birth may be different. In some countries, babies weighing less than 2 pounds are not counted as live births. This explains why U.S. babies have a better chance of survival despite a higher reported infant mortality rate.
There are socioeconomic differences in health outcomes under socialized medicine also. In England, infant mortality in the lowest socioeconomic class is double the rate in the highest class, just as it was before the introduction of the NHS in the late 1940s.

At best, medical care has a marginal impact on average life expectancy. In all but the least developed countries, life span is primarily a function of lifestyle, environment, education, and other genetic and social factors.

Insuring the uninsured would save money.
It is claimed that each uninsured person loses, on average, between ,645 and ,280 per year in lost wages and benefits. poorer quality of life, and shortened life expectancy. The free or discounted medical care that the uninsured receive costs about 0 to ,200 per person. According to a Kaiser Family Foundation study, the average annual insurance premium is ,383 for individual and ,068 for family coverage. Columnist Ellen Goodman may assume that one can just transfer the money spent subsidizing the care of the uninsured into an insurance policy. But even if one could, it wouldn’t be enough. Adding the hypothetical benefits in wages and life enhancement might still not be enough to pay for the insurance.

Preventive medicine saves money.
The rationale for eliminating copayments and deductibles is to keep people from forgoing preventive care, on the assumption that such intervention saves money in the long run. However, with few exceptions, preventive medicine, whatever its other virtues, raises overall medical costs.26
Even more importantly, "preventive" measures are not necessarily beneficial to everyone, with hormone replacement therapy as the most prominent current example. David Sackett writes: "The presumption that justifies the aggressive assertiveness with which we go after the unsuspecting healthy must be based on the highest level of randomized evidence that our preventive manoeuvre will, in fact, do more good than harm."

Medicare is nearly ideal.
The Physicians’ Working Group declares that "we are encouraged by Medicare’s generally open and reasoned approach."1 While conceding that Medicare could "use some fixing at the margins," Marcia Angell states that "because it is a nonprofit, single-payer system, Medicare is fairly efficient, with low overhead costs."
Whatever the administrative overhead costs, there is an enormous loss to the program from fraud-real fraud, not physician billing errors-inherent in the program’s nature. It is virtually a license to steal. Malcolm Sparrow of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University estimated fraud to constitute between 20 and 30 percent of Medicare payments.
Several of the most egregious fraud cases have involved the watchdogs themselves, the companies contracted with the government to examine and pay claims. Most are members of Blue Cross Blue Shield Association,33 of which only six of 44 were for-profits in 2002. Conflicts of interest are pervasive. Whistleblowers are indispensable. However, the threshold of error for carriers is more than 0 million, and the system seems designed to obstruct whistleblowing and protect the carrier, with the collusion of the Office of Inspector General and the courts.

What’s the Alternative?

The Physicians’ Working Group can think of only six alternatives to national health insurance, all of which are criticized as "incremental reforms" that would retain the role of private insurers, perpetuating administrative waste and making universal coverage unaffordable. These proposals are: "defined contribution" schemes; tax subsidies and vouchers for covering the uninsured; expansion of Medicaid, State Children’s Health Insurance Programs (SCHIP), and other public programs; employer mandates; and the Medicare HMO program and Medicare voucher schemes.1 Medical Savings Accounts are notably absent.
"The problems in the United States are systemic," the Physicians’ Working Group writes. "Incremental changes cannot solve them; further reliance on market-based strategies will exacerbate them. What needs to change is the system itself."1
The rest of the world, in contrast, has a mere funding problem.
The gauntlet has been laid down for those who do not like socialized medicine to "develop and propose something better, more effective, and with fewer adverse side effects."
The system does indeed need to be improved, but it is critical to diagnose correctly what the system is: Nearly half of all medical expenses are now paid for by the "single payer": government. Only about 20 percent of medical expenses are paid directly by patients. There has not been a free market in medicine in the U.S. for 50 years. Any incremental steps or leaps need to be in the right direction toward (1) getting the government out of medicine (see AAPS Medicare Reform Plan and White Paper); (2) restoring insurance to its proper function of reimbursing subscribers for catastrophic financial losses; (3) removing impediments, especially in the tax code and discriminatory hospital pricing, to direct payment by patients; (4) putting patients in charge of their medical dollars.

The answer, in a word, is freedom. Freedom is incompatible with any top-down, single, uniform, rigid Central Plan.23
French economist Frederick Bastiat had the answer in 1850: "Now that the legislators and do-gooders have so futilely inflicted so many systems upon society, may they finally end where they should have begun: May they reject all systems and try liberty."12}

Thanks, lev.Hi,

Just found this board today and found this topic too. I am Canadian, born there, had a child there and lived there for 35 years. Moved to the USA 3 years ago and have had a child here too.

I lived in big cities in Canada (ottawa, the capital) and Toronto. Live in a decent sized city here, Saint Louis. So my experience in both countries should be somewhat similar. And, we have GREAT insurance here (boy, would i hate it here if we didn't...)

Anyhow, i notice NO difference in the two healthcare systems at all. Having a child in Toronto was the same as having a child here. Same level of care, except for maybe the nurses were nicer at my hospital in toronto. The hospital food is better in the USA. And, I got a thank you/congrats card in the mail from the american nurses, the canadian nurses didn't do that. I actually found it kinda creepy that the nurses send out impersonal "thank you/congrats" type of cards - I guess trying to win your repeat business the next time you have a kid....

In Canada, there are no private universities... so every Cdn educated doctor has their education cost subsidized by the govt. Actually, same is true for any Cdn university student..... this has to in part justify their lower salaries.

Had RA issues in Toronto, saw a great rheum. Have RA issues here, and will see a rheum here tomorrow.

When it's all said and done I think that the Canadian system is better... it has it's issues, it's certainly not perfect, but it does not leave 50 million people out to hang. Yes, we pay higher taxes for it, but it's a price I am very willing to pay. I feel the American system is inherently injust and flawed. Perhaps that's a very canadian viewpoint (not "each man for himself") but it's how I feel.

Since I am a real live Canadian with real experience (and recent) and also a well-insured american resident, I am happy to field any questions.The website that you posted www.notcanada.com" or whatever it was is completely insulting. I found it disgusting and full of fear-mongering bullsh*t. Grow up.Lev, you never cease to amaze me. You sit and bitch that we pay too many taxes and in the same breath, support the war. You can't eat your cake and have it too. If you wanna have a war, you can PAY for it. That is the deal, got it? So please don't sit here and bitch that our tax base is too high. It is war time baby, get used to it!!Oh, and btw, I read the whole article and can totally relate to what this woman stated. I work around doctors EVERYDAY. I see how burned out they are. Many of them don't care. They are run ragged. The system is broke, we are burning out our health care professionals with the rising expectations of many Americans. It sucks to be in this system. Something has to give, and I hope soon. And Linncn, I think you are trying to pick a fight again with gimpy.Lorster, I'm around Docs too, but I don't see the burnout and not caring. I have met a few that charge way too much and have an arrogant attitude, but they are just a few. Our system is flawed, however I also think that if we didn't have people suing for crazy situations, people that have no problem "no showing" on appointments and people that can afford cigarrettes, alcohol and a few luxuries but cannot "afford" a better health plan add to the problem. I've met quite a few people that opt to save money and buy a cheaper plan and the bottom line, you get what you pay for. You can buy a dress at Bloomingdales that costs a whole bunch of money but lasts, or you can buy a dress at Walmart and wear it once and it may fall apart. People need to be educated. I also know that there are people that have financial difficulties and cannot afford anything, flip side, I know a chunk of these people that choose to "make more money under the table" and skip out on paying taxes.

There are always two sides to an argument. There are always going to be people that screw the system. And there will always be people that honestly are in financial difficulties. Not sure there is a perfect way to fix any of this.

I'll buy in to this one because it is something I am passionate about. I'm from Canada and live in Australia, both have excellent social medical systems. I know both systems well. I also have a brother who lives in the States and is in Insurance. He has two 20 something children who are now on their own as far as the need for private health insurance goes as they are no longer students on their parents insurance. My nephew smashed the lens of his eye with a stick when he was younger and has had a corneal transplant. He will have health issues for the rest of his life and be on anti rejection drugs etc. He will be unlikely to be approved for health insurance let alone be able to afford it. His pre-existing condition will knock him back. How will he be able to retain what little vision he has if he is not able to afford his medications and on going care. My neice is on the heavy side and my brother was having great difficulty finding an insurance policy that would accept her due to her weight and the likelihood of obesity related health problems in the future, at least health insurance that she could afford.

I think the issue comes back to the quality of insurance available and the affordability of that insurance. Yes the majority of Americans HAVE health insurance, the problems come when that health insurance is insufficient for their needs. The problem comes when those insurance companies refuse to approve treatments that a doctor has prescribed, or when they decide to change the rules and stop funding a medication or increase the co-pay necessary. Insurance companies in Australia cannot deny anyone cover nor charge anyone extra for pre-existing conditions.

There will always be horror stories from any health care system. What needs to be addressed is the availability of affordable health care for ALL people.

Gimpy, If this were an article From a major Insurance company group spouting the benefits of private Insurance you would be all over it. It's Spin at it's best. Why do you continually try and defend Canadas health system? One must also remember that the US size ( population ) is Far greater then Canada. It really is Apples and Oranges. We have up tp 20 million Illegals here. You maybe up to 120,000. And your fellow countrymen want then Gone . Look at thge articles in the Montreal Gazette and the Ottawa Citizen. Pretty clear how Canadiens feel. The cost here in the US would be off the charts. Who's is gonna pay that bill for there healthcare?? The stories on the under insured are endless. I took care of a 31 year old guy the other day who was responsible. He purchased a health care policy for himself. Had a 500 dollar deductible which is fairly decent these days. He developed transverse myelitis. He was to be on large doses of IV steroids for several days. His insurance company kicked him out of the hospital so he was to get the balance of his steroids through a home infusion company. Well, his insurance didn't cover home infusions. He had to pay for the home infusion out of his pocket, cash as they didn't take payments. He was screwed. He left very upset but in a dilemma because if he didn't get this therapy, he may become paralyzed. He was headed to the bank, on his way home to take out a loan, yes, a loan to pay for his health care. Now, that totally sucks. This is one small story and there are many more out there. 6T5, you have to have legal status (citizen, landed immigrant, etc) to be eligible for healthcare in Canada. You obviously didn't read the article you slam since that aspect was covered.

So, what parts of the article did you think were "spin" and not containing accurate information?So if an illegal alien walks into a hospital in say Toronto bleeding or worse they say " Sorry " can't help you??Like I said before, with my limited knowledge of the health care system in Canada, I can't accurately pick apart the article without putting in hours of research, which I don't care to do at this point. My problem with the article is that it flies directly in the face of first-hand stories I have heard from people who have gone across the border into the U.S. for health care because of the problems with the Canadian health care system. I'm not saying the article is completely wrong or biased, but it just doesn't jive with the information I already have. I admit our system is flawed but you're hell bent on making us all believe your way is the answer. Right now I'm just not sure. What I am sure about is that we need to make some changes that will incorporate the best of both systems. A pretty tall order.

There's no winning this argument on either side. You can have the last word. I'm done here.

hospitals in canada cannot deny coverage to anyone....if you walk into an ER they have to treat you. To answer your question directly, if you were an illegal alien and you walked into a toronto hospital, you'd be best to keep your immigration status to yourself and say you lost your wallet with your ID and Health Card. So anyway,

As I said, I don't think that anyone wants to not have everyone given healthcare but I think that it is very important to give consideration to repercussions to quick fixes, or as I've always called it, jumping on the bandwagon for revolutionary change with the "too hell with the consequenses" attitude. We all are feeling the painful results of all these "change now" followers with the biofuel bandwagon. How do you all like paying 60-100% more for almost everything you buy because of the "change now" people? Is your fuel and energy bills any smaller? Nope, as a matter of fact, even they are higher along with almost everything else. Let's take our time and do it right. That's what we should be demanding from our politicians, not "change now". That attitute is for a deer being chased by a lion. The world isn't going to fall apart if we don't "change right now". And Lorster, I really don't "bitch" about the taxes even tho I know that they could be less and I don't complain about the war. I do complain about idiots that think that we should pull out of Iraq and to hell with the millions of iraqis that will be slaughtered, especially those friendly with the US and the final outcome will be the iranian supported militias as the victors, but hey Lorster, the 2 million people raped, tortured, mutilated and killed in South Viet Nam after we pulled out and deserted those that faught for democracy and freedom believing that the US would stand by them and instead let them die in rivers of blood. That blood somehow just wasn't deep enough for people like you to cry over or to even give it a thought, right? Not your family, is it? Nobody is making anyone from your family to go and fight in the war, are they? You can sit and wear flowers in your hair and smoke a joint with Gimpy, and maybe you should, certainly the meds you are taking arn't working. And what I said is that "no one here in the United States will not be bitching if we had to pay the taxes that Canada has to pay". I mean where do you live? Everytime you speak about doctors or healthcare facilities or professionals they are "stupid", "paid off" "ignorant" "run ragged" . I have never been anyplace where I have seen those types of healthcare. I will say that when I first met Dr. Kansal and Dr. Richardson, I thought that they were somewhat "arrogant" but I came to realize that what I thought to be arrogance was actually, knowledge, competence, confidence, accomplishments, and an attitude of teacher to student.

cdndream, that you just "happened" on this forum and just "happened" on this thread is gimpy at best but hey, stranger things have happened. For you to say that you found that the "american nurses" sending you a congratultions/thankyou card as "creepy" shows that you are indeed a canadien, but by you saying that, you are creepy crawly. Maybe in canada if you get a thankyou card from another canadien maybe they want something but here in the US we actually send thankyou cards because we mean thankyou, probably a new concept to you, but get used to it, we americans are nice people, and it will probably take some time for you to get used to it. Fortunately for you there are a couple other america haters here and so you will find some like minded people here. Let me assure you that you are free to bash my country but be assured that when you do, I am going to give a rough road to ride, welcome to our wonderful forum.

LEV