My War of Words With the Canadian Health Care System

A representative of Canada's state-run health care system has rushed to the battle front to defend her system from evil conservative bloggers like moi. She writes:

Actually, the health care system in Canada does work. And it works pretty well. My family and I have enjoyed unrestricted access to specialists, general practitioners, surgeons, hospitals, outpatient departments, emergency rooms, and labs, just to name a few services, over the past few years for a variety of concerns – football injuries to hysterectomies to skin conditions to flu shots. I’ve never had to argue with a insurance company over what they would pay, nor have a copay to pay. There is no paperwork or bills to review or submit – we just show our health care card at the hospital or doctor’s office or walk-in clinic.

Of course there are idiots, horror stories, and cracks that people fall through in Canada. Just like the horror stories in the States – and this is confirmed by my family in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Texas and Missouri tell me – (all born and raised in US, so they are not used to, nor probably even aware of, what we have up in Canada and therefore cannot be accused of bias). And there are people that complain bitterly about anything and everything.

- Remember that Canadian woman who had to go to the States for her brain tumour to be removed? It was not cancer, it was not growing appreciably, and the Canadian health care services would have operated on it, close to her own home, in 6 months time, without any change in her overall health. And cost her no money. Instead she had it operated on “instantly” in the US, because she didn’t want to wait, and now is complaining (tearfully on CNN via YouTube) that she is devastated by the bill of over $100,000. That is a reality of the States health care system.

On average, we live longer than the population in the States. Fewer of our babies die in infancy. We have better outcomes in almost every measure of health care – including surgery! We pay through taxes less than half you do in the States for more care. Our health care is not “socialized medicine” – we pay taxes (like you do) and in return, the government allocates $ to each province (like states) for a list of basic health care (prenatal care to surgeries to emergency rooms) to be provided to every Canadian citizen. Period. You do not call it Socialized Agriculture when your government subsidizes farmers? You don’t call it Socialized Free Enterprise when your government reduces tax to business. Socialized Highways, Socialized Parks? Socialized Defence?

Please don’t write off health care systems that are maybe just different from yours.

Her email server really is owned by the interiorhealth.ca domain, so it appears legit. I replied:

Please read the following from the NIH, Stanford University and other professional opinions.  Follow the links for attribution.  I'll wait patiently for your corrections.  Best Regards, Doug

• The work of Barbara Starfield and others has repeatedly shown that having a family doctor is the single best way to ensure access to sound health care.  Yet a 2006 study revealed that 17% of Canadians do not have family physicians—about 5 million Canadians have no family doctor. Of these 5 million, around 2 million have sought unsuccessfully for one.  The NIH reports that "...with an aging family physician population and a projected increase in the population of seniors as baby boomers reach retirement, there is a looming crisis in primary care in Canada."

• The Chief of Neuroradiology at Stanford reports the following, which utterly refutes your claims: "1. Americans have better survival rates than Europeans for common cancers.

Breast cancer mortality is 52 percent higher in Germany than in the United States and 88 percent higher in the United Kingdom. Prostate cancer mortality is 604 percent higher in the United Kingdom and 457 percent higher in Norway. The mortality rate for colorectal cancer among British men and women is about 40 percent higher. ... 2. Americans have lower cancer mortality rates than Canadians. Breast cancer mortality in Canada is 9 percent higher than in the United States, prostate cancer is 184 percent higher, and colon cancer among men is about 10 percent higher. ... 3. Americans have better access to treatment for chronic diseases than patients in other developed countries. Some 56 percent of Americans who could benefit from statin drugs, which reduce cholesterol and protect against heart disease, are taking them. By comparison, of those patients who could benefit from these drugs, only 36 percent of the Dutch, 29 percent of the Swiss, 26 percent of Germans, 23 percent of Britons, and 17 percent of Italians receive them."

• In 2009 about 2,500 Canadians per month sought medical treatment in the U.S. because of accessibility, long waits and life-threatening conditions.

• There is a projected $36 trillion shortfall in funding for Medicare and Medicaid.

• California's Medi-Cal program is an unmitigated disaster, burning a $14 billion hole in a state with a nearly $50 billion overall budget shortfall.

• Single-payer has failed cancer patients and children in the UK. It has condemned patients to long and sometimes fatal waits for routine tests in Canada (e.g., "Excessive wait times for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies are a major problem in the Canadian healthcare system." Healthcare Policy, Canada, 2009).

• The UK's NHS is broke and fading fast.

• "British cancer patients are substantially more likely to die of the disease than those in other western European countries because of poor access to the latest drugs, according to an authoritative report to be published today." (Cancer survival rates worst in western Europe: Telegraph, UK, 2007)

• As for anecdotes?  Here's one that describes what U.S. diplomatic officials see every day.

I am an American living and working in [Canadian City]. Please do not use my name, but I am a Foreign Service Officer at the U.S. Consulate here... working in the... visas section. I could get in big trouble professionally for telling you this.

...I had numerous opportunities to work on cases in which Canadians were attempting to emigrate to the U.S. primarily for medical procedures. In one case, a U.S. citizen father was petitioning for his [Canadian adult] son to join him in [state]...

...His son had a non-Hodgkins lymphoma, and was unable to obtain the necessary treatments in Canada. In the U.S., two physicians had examined him and basically concluded that, because the disease had not spread above his neck, that he could be saved. In Canada, this young man was under a death sentence. Once I was satisfied that his medical costs would not be borne by U.S. taxpayers, I got him his visa and (hopefully) another chance at life.

* * * * * * * * *
[There was another] case of a young Canadian mother, in tears, who had recently given birth to a child with cerebral palsy. Her husband, a U.S. citizen working in Canada, was able to transmit U.S. citizenship to his infant son and he was petitioning for his wife so that the family could move to Chicago. Why? So the boy could get the treatment that he needed in the U.S., which was superior to that in Canada.

* * * * * * * * *
[We all] had several cases of nurses, doctors, and [X-ray] technicians who emigrated to the U.S. for professional reasons. Sometimes it was for the opportunity to earn more money (one doctor, earning about $85K annually Canadian, had a job offer at a clinic in Buffalo for $300K U.S.). For others, it was a chance to to do what they were trained to do - in the U.S., [an X-ray] technician has the equipment and facilities to ply his trade, whereas in Canada the opportunities to do so are quite limited.

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I realize that this is all anecdotal and not statistically based, but in my experience the only Canadians who are satisfied with the system here are people who are healthy. I do not mean that in a snide attempt to be funny, I am serious - it is a good program for young healthy couples with one or two children who need vaccinations and routine appointments.

However, if you get sick, this is not the place to be.

Lastly, a comment - U.S. health care is a good value for the money. Would you rather have 2009 health care at 2009 prices, in the U.S., or 1970 health care at 1970 prices? The answer is obvious, and even our own Congress knows it. I am pretty sure that Ted Kennedy would not choose to have his brain cancer treated anywhere but the U.S., and the same is true for John Kerry's prostate cancer.

* * *
"Access to a waiting list is not access to health care" --Chief Justice Beverly McLachlin, Supreme Court of Canada (Chaoulli v. Quebec)

In 2007 the Canadian government issued a series of reports to address the outcry over long wait times for critical tests, procedures and surgeries. Over a two year period:

  • Wait times for knee replacements dropped from 440 to 307 days.
  • Wait times for hip replacements dropped from 351 to 257 days.
  • Wait times for cataract surgeries dropped from 311 to 183 days.
  • Wait times for MRIs dropped from 120 to 105 days.
  • Wait times for CT scans dropped from 81 to 62 days.
  • Wait times for bypass surgeries dropped from 49 to 48 days.

These "improvements" are unheard of in the United States. Waiting 48 days for a bypass or 105 days for an MRI could very well be a death sentence.

The public has fought for 50-plus years to build a publicly funded Medicare system that they’re now telling us isn’t quite working for them. -- Health Care in Canada Round Table 2005

A Commonwealth Fund 2005 International Health Policy Survey (slide 16) showed that 41% of patients in the UK and 33% of patients in Canada waited more than 4 months for non-emergency surgery. Only 8% American patients waited more than 4 months for surgery.

Meanwhile, in Hamilton, Ontario, hospitals have received an infusion of cash to cut wait times for diagnostic procedures and certain surgeries, which have become intolerable.

And these are precisely the type of government-controlled health-care systems proposed by the Democratic candidates. Not only are they destined for failure, they will cost thousands of lives. And with the UK and Canada as examples, everyone can see the train-wreck coming.

Story after story after story describes the Canadian health care system in crisis. CBS News and The New York Times are among the sources.
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For many Canadians, the choice is crystal clear: you can receive "free" health care and die -- or you can receive treatment in the U.S., pay for it, and live. Worst-case, the choice is death -- or bankruptcy. Which would you choose for a loved one?