I don't have a current answer to the health care issue but here's a good article on the pros and cons of
Canadian Health care system. It points out the difficulty of providing healthcare that will satisfy everyone.

JCL I'm sure will have a comment or two regarding the content.
It's too long to post but is worth the read because of the various
philosophical statements made which provide the basis for the arguments made.


Canadian Health Care - Lucretius - Mises Institute

Another opinion...Public Option for healthcare is "Son of Medicaid"....

Henninger: 'Public Option' Is Son of Medicaid - WSJ.com

I'll keep it to a comment or two. The article is nine years old. It is also based on a faulty premise, since it claims that as a Canadian I have no option except to wait for service or go to the US if I don't want to wait. I have just had a phone call to remind me of my annual physical, a 3-4 hour exam, for which the clinic is paid privately. It is not funded by the provincial health ministry at all.

Universal access does not have to mean that private medical services are banned, the two can coexist.

How old the article may be is only relevant if the Canadian system
has had a change to the extent that the information is no longer accurate.
The more I read the more I find that many still share the stated view.
Never the less the article was posted as an opinion for comparative purposes.

But for sake of argument, if current information is to be believed then
this source should prove to be invaluable. Health Consumer Powerhouse

How does Canada Compare to Europe on Health Care? It's 23rd out of 32 countries: Is that good or bad?. I'll leave that to the experts to decide.

I haven't seen the Powerhouse articles before. Not sure I see the relevance of comparing Canada to their member country results, because I don't know the weighting they put on various factors, and I don't live in Estonia. Isn't the article a little self-serving? :rofl:

I don't think the Canadian health care system is anywhere near perfect. I personally think that basic health care is a human right, not a business opportunity. I have no problem with for-profit health care delivery services (I use them myself) as long as there is a standard of care for those not able to purchase care.

:iagree: With the first part. But wouldn't you agree that in order for the people to have
health care as a human right those who administer it should do so without cost? That way everyone would receive the same care.

I guess the problem is the fact that we as a human race still depend
on a monetary system that fosters greed.........:dunno:

No, I wouldn't agree. I think that there should be a form of health insurance that is not for-profit. (I would also include the 6 other points that Berwick listed) There should also be hospitals that are available to all. But why does that imply that private hospitals should not be available? It is the same falacy as the philosophy article posted that says everyone must use the same hospital, and if one person can't get private care then nobody should get it. That doesn't make sense to me.

Ensuring that care is provided doesn't mean eliminating free market delivery of that service.

How about Congress concentrate their efforts on just the Major Medical portion of healthcare? The day-to-day stuff, most of us can afford (which is why many of the "uninsured", like myself, are uninsured, but still keep up with seeing their doctors & dentists & eye doctors) Just because your are uninsured, doesn't mean you are not getting medical treatment.

Any attempt to cover day-to-day costs is going to be abused with all sorts of ripoffs, just as Medicare is and all the other insured programs. Until they figure out how to miminize the fraud that is rampant now, it will just be another waste of money most of us have worked too hard to see it squandered this way.

Over hauling malpractice should be a top priority - I've heard somewhere between 70-90% of all claims are caused by 10% of the doctors - why doesn't the AMA weedout these "bad" doctors - My father has a friend who was a thorasic surgeon. He never had anyone charge him with any kind of wrong doing in his entire career, yet when he finally called it quits, his malpractice insurance was costing him more than 50% of his income. We are losing good doctors because they have to bear the burden of "bad" doctors.

:iagree:

Just don't subsidize it to the point that you push the for-profit one out by making it completely expensive, that is my fear with the US. The question then would become, what is the standard of care? And I'll say this again, before the US does ANYTHING with overall health care, they need to address the VA!!!!!!!!!

I am not sure what the right balance is, but with respect to the Canada Health Act (which is insurance, not a health service as some seem to think), something like 70% of health spending in Canada comes from public funding, and 30% comes from private funding (source: CIHI)