BoatBanter.com - Canada's health care crisis

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A Usenet persona calling itself BCITORGB wrote:

Scott leads us through some convoluted reasoning:
================
She need only wait till the money's available or her parents can find a
charitable program or hospital to do the surgery pro bono. In Canada,
it's
not possible to take out a loan or get a grant and get the surgery done
in a
timely manner, so what was an acute injury will turn into a chronic
disability due to lack of timely medical care that may cripple the
child for
life.

Is it likely that as people with
insurance arrive, some "bureaucrat" in the hospital will priorize and
thereby establish a "waiting list"?

Nope. The priority is set by the patient.

Nope. If it were, the girl would get her knee surgery.

Can you assure me that, under the American system, the teenager will
get immediate attention,

Yup.
===================

You assure me she'll get immediate attention, but earlier you said
she'll get attention when the money becomes available. I established in
my scenario that the was NO insurance and let's say, no money.

How is the priority set by the patient. Sauppose she says: "I want to
be #1." Does that make her #1? Of course not. And who tells her she
can't be #1? Likely some hospital bureaucrat. Hmmm.... sounds like what
you describe the Canadian system to be like. At least in Canada, her
condition determines her priority.

Difference is that if she doesn't like the priority given to her based on
her income, she can seek out another service provider willing to put her
higher on the list. Canadians can't.
--
Regards,
Scott Weiser

"I love the Internet, I no longer have to depend on
friends, family and co-workers, I can annoy people WORLDWIDE!" TM

© 2005 Scott Weiser

A Usenet persona calling itself BCITORGB wrote:

Scott replies:
================
Tell me about your waiting lists for non-emergent cases without
insurance, OK?

That would be, perhaps, a list used by a charitable organization.
However,
the point is that in the US, the teenager is not *prohibited* from
seeking
out and obtaining any medical care that she needs from a provider
willing to provide the service. In Canada, no matter how willing the
surgeon, no matter how ready the charity is to pay for it...or the
parents for that matter,
government bureaucrats decide who gets to be treated
====================

Bottom line: a teenager without insurance and without money is
"prohibited" insofar as her freedom to seek care is illusionary. Fine
in principle, nonexistant in practice.

Nope. She can seek out medical care wherever and whenever she likes. All she
has to do is find a provider willing to provide the care for what she can
(or cannot) pay in return. That she can't walk into her corner hospital and
*demand* service is not important. What's important is that she can choose
freely from among tens of thousands of hospitals and hundreds of thousands
to millions of doctors and specialty clinics and obtain immediate treatment
from any who are willing to serve her. In Canada, she isn't allowed to even
seek out a hospital or surgeon willing to treat her, perhaps pro bono,
because her position in the queue is dictated by the government.

And, can we establish somehow, some way, for the last time, there is no
"government bureaucrat" making these decisions.

Sure there is.

If there is such a guy,
please give me his title. Where does he reside in the bureaucracy? Is
he federal? Provincial? Local?

Well, there's the hospital Admissions Director, to begin with...

--
Regards,
Scott Weiser

"I love the Internet, I no longer have to depend on
friends, family and co-workers, I can annoy people WORLDWIDE!" TM

© 2005 Scott Weiser

in article , Scott Weiser at
wrote on 3/28/05 4:07 PM:

A Usenet persona calling itself KMAN wrote:

in article , Scott Weiser at
wrote on 3/27/05 7:46 PM:

A Usenet persona calling itself BCITORGB wrote:

Scott, commenting on many (most) in Canada getting immediate ca
==================
Yup. While at the same time, teenagers who need knee surgery have to
wait
three years.
==================

Notwithstanding the protestations of rick, several of us from Canada
have commented on, and admitted, that one of the consequences of our
style of healthcare is that, for some procedures, there are waiting
lists. That's a fact. But it's a price we're willing to pay,

I doubt you speak for everyone, or even a substantial number of Canadians,
given how much dissatisfaction there is in Canada now and how many calls for
privatization and reform.

There is a much stronger desire for universal health care in the US than the
dismantling of universal health care in Canada.

From: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4798058/

Why can't the richest nation in the world provide health-care coverage to
all its people?

Because we understand the evils of socialized medicine, having watched other
nations struggle and fail at it.

The answer: It's not that Americans don't want to cover the 41 million
uninsured . And the cost, pegged by Kaiser Commission on Medicaid & the
Uninsured at less than $69 billion a year, isn't insurmountable, adding just
6 percent to annual health spending.

It's just that no consensus exists -- in the public, among politicians, or
in the health industries -- about how best to get the job done. And because
the vast majority of voters have health insurance (85 percent of the
population is insured, but 92 percent of those who participated in the 2000
election were covered), political leaders have little incentive to overcome
that impasse.

Nor should they feel compelled to do so. It is not government's job to
supply health care.

That's not to say Americans don't wish that health care was available to
all. Some 62 percent support universal coverage, according to an October,
2003, Washington Post/ABC News Poll.

Sure, if someone could wave a magic wand and give everybody free health care
without all the awful things that happen under socialized medicine, who
wouldn't think it's a good idea. But asking people if they like the idea of
free health care is in itself a "push poll" question. When people find out
the actual costs involved, and the inevitable waste, fraud and
unavailability of socialized health care, they strongly reject it, which is
why the Democrats aren't able to hornswoggle people into pushing Congress
into such a disaster.

We intuitively understand, based on long experience, that government-run
monopolies are ALWAYS wasteful, inefficient and rarely provide even a
fraction of the promised benefits. The VA is a classic example of "socialize
medicine," and it's a dismal failure even for the relatively small number of
ex-soldiers who were promised a lifetime of free health care for their
service. And anybody on Medicare can tell you that even such cash-subsidy
government programs are a failure too.

Fact is that most Americans would rather pay more and have immediate access
to the best health care system on the planet, without government
intervention, than get the nothing-for-something that inevitably results
from socialized medicine.

We'll see.

Scotty asserts:
================
Thus, 50 renters in an apartment building split the costs of the
property tax, which is based on the acreage of land, not the income
from rents, and so they are, essentially, free riders on the system.
==================

Perhaps that's how property tax is calculated in CO. In BC, your
millrate is a function of your property's assessed MARKET VALUE.
(Acreage is thus irrelevant)

So, for a multi-unit apartment building, the market value will
presumably be quite high, and thus the tenants do carry a tax burden.

frtzw906
=================

Scott thinks:
================
In Canada, however, compensation for nurses and doctors outside of
private
practices, particularly surgeons, is government controlled, so there is
little motivation to become a surgeon or a nurse. This leads to more
shortages, which leads to inadequate staffing, which leads to empty
beds
because there's no one to care for patients.
==============

Sorry Scotty, in Canada the compensation for doctors and nurses is
governed by a bargaining process between, for example, the nurses union
and various local/regional health boards. Here, in the Vancouver area,
for example, the doctor's union/association will bargain with, among
others, the board representing the Catholic hospitals in the region.

The doctor's association bargains for the pay schedule amounts which
determines doctors' pay.

Hmmmm.... bargaining.... what a unique concept....

As to med schools responding to market conditions.... well, I'm from
Missouri... are you telling me there's no collusion between the AMA
(that is the doc's association, right) and the med schools?

frtzw906

A Usenet persona calling itself BCITORGB wrote:

Scotty asserts:
================
Thus, 50 renters in an apartment building split the costs of the
property tax, which is based on the acreage of land, not the income
from rents, and so they are, essentially, free riders on the system.
==================

Perhaps that's how property tax is calculated in CO. In BC, your
millrate is a function of your property's assessed MARKET VALUE.
(Acreage is thus irrelevant)

So, for a multi-unit apartment building, the market value will
presumably be quite high, and thus the tenants do carry a tax burden.

Mill levies are set based on the "assessed value" which does factor in both
use and comparative property values along with parcel size, but while the
mill levy is set each year, the assessment is changed only about every five
years. There is no direct link between the income the property generates
from year to year and the assessable value of the property, so no, the
renters don't pay their "fair share" of the school taxes.

--
Regards,
Scott Weiser

"I love the Internet, I no longer have to depend on
friends, family and co-workers, I can annoy people WORLDWIDE!" TM

© 2005 Scott Weiser

Scott asserts without knowing the facts:
================
Difference is that if she doesn't like the priority given to her based
on
her income, she can seek out another service provider willing to put
her
higher on the list. Canadians can't.
==============

Not quite correct. When my father-in-law didn't like the coronary
surgery options available to him in his smaller community, he asked his
GP to refer him to one of the surgeons in the preemminent heart
hospital in a larger city.

No problem.

And, when it came time for the surgery, he was helicoptered onto the
roof of the city hospital from his island community. [damned good
service if you ask me]. In this case, HE chose his surgeon and HE chose
the hospital and he got his wishes.

The problem with you, Scotty, is that you make up what goes on in
Canada and/or you comb the internet for one-off bad examples. Yet those
of us who live here and have experience (BCITORGB, KMAN, Michael, etc)
with the system know that what you insist is true is, in fact, a
fantasy.

frtzw906