Thank Heaven We Don’t Have Canadian Style Healthcare #1
For years Americans have been bombarded with distortions and outright lies about Canada’s single payer health care system — all part of a right wing campaign to keep voters in this country from even considering a similar option. Then the other day I came upon a piece by Bill Mann on the Marketwatch website in which he was discussing an article in the most recent online edition of the AARP journal. Here’s part of what Mann wrote:
“It’s a relief to see hard facts finally emerging on this side of the border about Canada’s single-payer health-care system.
For years I’ve heard Canada’s popular medicare (the Canadian term for universal health care) system slagged by lies, distortions, and outright ignorance on U.S. radio talk shows and other American popular media (where do people GET this stuff?). And for years, I’ve tried to set the record straight in my online and newspaper columns, having lived in Canada and actually having used their system. My son and his family are now covered by it in Vancouver… “
Mann went on to say that Canadians generally quite like their health care system.
I was of course intrigued by Mann’s comments and went to the AARP article he referenced on their website. It is titled “5 Myths About Canada’s Health Care System; The truth may surprise you about international health car.” It was written by Aaron E. Carroll, M.D., the director of the Center for Health Policy and Professionalism Research in Indianapolis. Here are snippets from just two of the myth’s he debunks.
Myth #1: Canadians are flocking to the United States to get medical care.
…the study’s authors examined data from the 18,000 Canadians who participated in the National Population Health Survey. In the previous year, 90 of those 18,000 Canadians had received care in the United States; only 20 of them, however, reported going to the United States expressively for the purpose of obtaining care.
Myth #2: Doctors in Canada are flocking to the United States to practice.
… In 2004, net emigration became net immigration. Let me say that again. More doctors were moving into Canada than were moving out.
The other myths Carroll debunks in this piece involve long waits for care, and comparing the kind of health care rationing that takes place in Canada compared to this country. Interesting stuff all around.
This article pretty much destroys the arguments of the ideologues who want you to believe that a single payer system is not only “socialist” (a supposed evil in itself) but detrimental to a nation’s health. And remember, this appeared in a publication of AARP — not exactly a left-wing outfit.
You can read Mann’s entire piece at http://www.marketwatch.com/story/myths-about-canada-us-health-care-debunked-2012-08-09?link=MW_home_latest_news and the entire AARP article at http://www.aarp.org/politics-society/government-elections/info-03-2012/myths-canada-health-care.html
Share This
Related Posts
-
The Politics behind the Killing of Americans
Posted on Apr 5, 2013
-
The Paul Ryan Magical Mystery Chop, Dice, and Slice Budget
Posted on Mar 22, 2013
-
Like Atlas In An Ayn Rand Novel, Stock Markets Shrug
Posted on Mar 20, 2013
-
My Farewell To The Democratic Party
Posted on Mar 15, 2013
Also in, Climate Change is real, lower taxes for the top earners does not translate into jobs for middle America, welfare isn’t bloated because millions of Americans just don’t want to work, and high level deregulation of mammoth industries actually tends to screw the general public. Go ahead and pretty much take your pick of any topic covered by conservative media outlet, do some digging, and you’ll find talking points supported by nothing more than wishful thinking, bad data, and even worse analysis.
+1 to slamfu
I have family members who have been paying into the Canadian system for years, only to get 2nd rate service and treatments. The waits are months, if you’re lucky; years are more likely. My stepfather’s knee surguries (both knees) took 18 months from the time the procedure was diagnosed. He was lucky. Here, it’s weeks. I could get the exact same procedure within a week or two of the doctor agreeing it is necessary, and then, the wait depends mostly on MY schedule, not the practitioner.
We haven’t had a free market health care system in this country for decades. Before ObamaCare, our health care system was inadequate and messed up, but only to the extent that it WAS NOT a free market system. Capitalism cannot be blamed for the problems caused by a system that includes a monstrosity such as Medicare.
Capitalism can and will make health care inexpensive for everyone. It worked before. Don’t make the healthy slaves to the sick.
Go here, if you want the real story:
WeStandFirm.org
The whole system should be single payor from burth to death.
That would solve the Medicare problem and insure adequate coverage for everyone.
If you make $20K a year and pay 6.65% for social security and Medicare, the 500K or 10 million pays 6.65% on all income including investments. Everyone is equal!
Sorry..That is 7.65%
@RP
I hate to say it, but SS and Medicare should have a higher cap than the +$100K amount now. But 7% on billions is too much.
I have German public health insurance… it is great. My wife has private health insurance. For the extra cost, she gets instant access to everything she needs.
You see in intelligent nations. You can have BOTH public and private coverage…depending on what you want to pay.
and of course everyone is covered.
please ignore the terrible grammar above
you see, intelligent people should reread their posts before hitting submit 
@ RP
Yes, everyone is the same PERCENTAGE, but very unequal when it comes to DOLLARS! In your example, the low income individual would pay $1530, and the high income individual would pay $765,000, regardless of what medical treatments they actually received.
And that is the whole problem with “single payer” (a euphemism for “socialized medicine”). The whole purpose of the system is to divorce what people pay from what they actually receive in care. This is immoral.
Here is an example different than yours that illustrates the immorality of your socialized system: Two people, each earning 20k. One is diabetically obese and the other eats well and exercises. The first accrues $50,000 of costs to the system in medical care and the second accrues none because he is healthy. They both pay 7.65%. Is that moral?
No, it is not. This is the healthy as slaves to the sick.
@SL:
Likewise I had Belgian health insurance for five years –for peanuts wotth of premiums– for the family, including my aging mother-in-law, who had at least two major surgeries (heart surgery and hip replacement)
Care was quick and superb. Recovery and post-surgery care, equally superb.
So, it can be done, it is done.
Reading your US Health Care Industry talking points it’s obvious that you didn’t read the AARP link that Kay Wood provided so here’s the highlights:
5 Myths About Canada’s Health Care System – April 16, 2012
Longer wait times are a byproduct of Canada’s choice to be fiscally conservative.
Too funny!
The reason you pay into Medicare when you are young and healthy is because of the fact that as you get older you will either gradually become less healthy with more medical problems or you will die young with a strong and healthy body… There are no other options.
You might benefit from reading the AARP (the sick old people group) article and the dictionary definition of ‘moral.’… then re-considering what is and is not moral.
@SteveK
Funny how the Canadians avoided the housing bubble and mortgage mess because of conservative borrowing and lending. Both Canada and Germany didn’t allow banks to over leverage,
http://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0211/Canadian-Mortgage-Changes-You-Need-To-Know.aspx
“Capitalism can and will make health care inexpensive for everyone.”
I hasn’t and it won’t. And I can tell you exactly why. In a functional capitalist free market, buyers and sellers are able to freely make choices. In this case I’m going to focus on the buyers. If I want a new car, I go shopping. Depending on what I want and how much I have to spend I can buy myself a $60,000 BMW. Or, if I either don’t have the money or just don’t need all that extra luxury I can buy a nice sensible Honda Civic. But I get make a choice. I can plan what I’m going to spend and what I am going to get for whatever I am willing to shell out. That is the hallmark of the “Free Market”.
Medical care is not about choice. Having a sudden and urgent medical issue is like taking my previous example, and saying instead of making a choice, I am buying that BMW for $60k regardless of whether or not I can afford it, and without making plans to do so. Which is the state of all of us sooner or later. Barring a sudden death, all of us are going to need expensive medical care at some point and we are likely not going to know when that cost is going to hit us. Since we know that all of us are going to be in this boat, the idea of treating medical care like a standard good or service is clearly absurd. In fact I think it is one of the most clear examples of a cost that should be born by society, i.e. a socialized cost. Market forces will charge whatever the market will bear for a good or service. The medical industry practically has a gun to the head of its customers. This free market is no free market. Anyone who wants to pretend that it is clearly has not thought it through, and/or doesn’t understand how free markets work, and how they don’t.
This mantra about raw capitalism being the cure for everything is pretty fossilized. Sure, it’s an important component of our economic philosophy, but good bourbon isn’t 100% alchohol is it. Social responsibility has always been a key to our country’s success and despite efforts of the political right to ignore (or worse – demonize) that responsibility, it is essential. And btw, I have many friends in Ontario who are very happy with their healthcare system. They have zero interest in trading it for ours.
Well said zephyr… Though for the last twenty years or so it seems to have become popular with some to think only of themselves, even when many of them could use, or are guiltily accepting, help themselves.
I’ve friends in BC who feel the same way but you know there are complainers everywhere.
I’ve acquaintances who are better off now than when they were working, but their favorite pastime (avocation?) is to complain about how bad off they are and what poor service they receive… from everybody. Medicare, the doctor, the lab, the grocery store, the restaurant. You name it and that’s where they’re getting lousy service.
I’ve a nickname for them, I call them Republicans. It’s fun, I can call them Republican to their face and they just smile and give me a little nod… I smile and nod back.