I WISH THERE WERE INFO SITES THAT ACTUALLY UNBIASLY WEIGHED THE PROS AND CONS. EVERY SITE THAT I HAVE VISITED SEEMS TO TRY TO CONVINCE ME BY GENERALIZATIONS VERSES JUST PROVIDING THE TOTALLY ACCURATE INFO.

THIS SITE WAS VERY INTERESTING AND I KNOW THAT BLOGS ARE PERSONAL OPINION, BUT I AM IN SEARCH OF THE SITE THE I DESCRIBED. ANY IDEAS WHERE AND IF THIS SITE EXISTS?

SInce you say the hospital (emergency rooms) pass this on to their paying customers and insurance companies (raise their prices from what the actual cost is), do they do the same with MediCare and MediCaid costs above the allowable?

Whether it will be called universal health care or socialized medicine, our Federal government is not who should implement it, as they have the Postal Service, the Federal Reserve, Social Security and aid to local education.

My best friends mom is in medical sales and was talking about how a large part of health insurance $$ goes towards processing and paying claims. Organizational bloat, in other words. If everyone was guaranteed access, you would be cutting that from the cost immediately. This isn’t just anecdotal, either. I have seen the statistic elsewhere and it is a large reason Indian hospitals have started to do the processing on their night shift. (US hospitals outsource it to them)
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There’s one great myth about Canadian health- its all socialized. It is not. In fact, there are many private providers who work in parallel with the government- usually specialists with their license to provide private services issued by the government. For example, MRI clinics can be both run by the government and private providers. Granted, the number of licenses granted are pretty small but it is not an either or situation in Canada (the myth is used by governments as a means to claim they are defending the average Canadian and garner votes when the reality is a little different).

As a non-American, I do find it strange that entitlements attach to jobs- an area with no security and with laws that, in many jurisdictions, favor the employer. If you took out the insurance expense from employers and off-set that with a payroll tax which allowed the taxpayer complete portability to use their health care dollars, I am not sure anyone is better or worse off because…

I have always thought that health care reform meant picking between the tyranny of the insurance company and the tyranny of government bureaucrats. All you are doing is picking what type of problems you want (government inefficiency or greater opportunity for denial of coverage).

There is no perfect reform and anyone who thinks the status quo is perfect or the proposed reform is perfect is drinking the crazy Kool-Aid.

Keep up the good work.

Millionaire and other Canada defenders, another cause of the long wait lines is a lack of doctors. They have 2.1 doctors per 1000 people whereas the average for other countries (US included) is 3.1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_Canada#Medical_professional_shortage. One of the reasons is low pay relative to other countries. Canadian doctors come to the states to make more money, both my GP and chiropractor are Canadian. I did want to make sure that y’all knew that I’d still take what you’ve got over what I’ve got currently. Other systems work better than Canada, but I used my neighbors to the north in order to illustrate what could go wrong. Thanks for the input.

A couple of thoughts:

1) Universal health care doesn’t mean that everything is free – but rather than the costs are the same for everyone. In Canada for example: drugs, dental, eye exams and hospital rooms (oddly enough) are not paid for by the government. Canadian either have health insurance (same deal as the US) or pay out of pocket when needed. Probably the biggest difference is things like major operations which can be a financial disaster for an uninsured American but not for a Canadian.

2) Wait times – it’s easy to pull single stats to support your argument so I’ll pull one of my own…my Dad has (unfortunately) been a major beneficiary of our healthcare system in the last couple of years and I can tell you that he hasn’t had to wait 22 months for anything. MRIs, CAT scans, you name it and he’s done it. He’s also had pretty good access to various specialists.

I can’t dispute the 22 month MRI in Saskatoon stat (although I am very skeptical) but don’t forget that there are other factors at play.

A) Access to specialists and equipment is often determined (in theory) by need – if you get your family doctor to refer you for a MRI because of a light knee “twinge” then you might have a longer wait than someone who fell out of bed and can’t walk.

B) Bigger cities have more medical equipment and doctors/specialists per person than smaller cities. I don’t know if this is true in the US as well but it’s definitely true in Canada. The population of Saskatchewan is around 1 million (I just looked it up) and the largest city has only 233,000 people. Without even reading your article I could have told you that access to medical care in Saskatchewan is not as good as in Toronto. If you live in a small city and need a specialist/test then you have to travel. I don’t think the type of health care funding affects this.