Sicko in Canada

[babylonsister]

I received this in an e-mail yesterday from a friend in CA who thinks there's nothing wrong with the US healthcare system (she's married to a Brit, BTW). She does think illegal immigrants all need to go home and they're what's weighing our system down (most likely not her husband though, who's by now probably legal).



Sicko in Canada
2007/06/28

Jeff Hoard wrote recently about how fortunate he was that when he broke his arm as a kid, he broke it in Canada, where socialized medicine is in place, rather than in the U.S. We hope that Jeff doesn't encounter any serious medical problems, so he can remain content in his "workers' paradise."

Canadian Lindsay McCreith is not content. As David Gratzer, a health care expert and practicing physician licensed in Canada and the U.S., reports, McCreith was required to wait for four months just to get an MRI, and then months more to see a neurologist for his malignant brain tumor. Frustrated and ill, he traveled to Buffalo, N.Y. for a lifesaving surgery. Now he's suing for the right to opt out of Canada's government-run health care, which he considers dangerous to his health.

http://opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110010266

According to Gratzer, McCreith's experience is sufficiently typical that Canadians are increasingly looking to market-based approaches to health care. Canadian doctors, disgruntled by the health care system, elected Brian Day, a leading critic of Candian medicare, to be president of their national association. Dr. Day opened a private surgery hospital and challenged the government to shut it down. He explained that Canada "is a country in which dogs can get a hip replacement in under a week and in which humans can wait two to three years."

Gratzner shows that European countries such as Britain, Sweden, and Germany are also experimenting with privatization of their health care delivery system. Before the U.S. plunges headlong into socialized medicine, we would do well to study the experiences of Canada and Western Europe. And by study, I don't mean watching a movie by a dishonest propagandist.
(Obligatory slam on MM here)
http://blogs.nypost.com/movies/archives/2007/06/kyle_smith_on_m.html#more

[ringtailtooter]

1. I saw SiCKO last weekend at a preview in Sarasota and was talking to a lady after

the show and she said the propaganda machines were starting to churn out the anti-national health care smear. It was already showing up in Miami. Don't believe everything you see on the net and TV, one never knows where it comes from.

[ReadTomPaine]

5. Bingo - they are going to use both barrels to stop SiCKO from getting the attention it deserves. n/t

[Spazito]

2. It seems the backlash to the truth about US health care is up

and running including the use of misleading e-mails. It is interesting to see what they plan to use in this endeavor, this e-mail is enlightening for sure.

Thanks for posting, I think the expression "forewarned is forearmed" is a good one here, lol.

Edited to add:

I just realized I fell for the e-mail in this sense: The issue is NOT waiting times, it is everyone being able to access health care regardless of their financial position. The issue is being able to access health care and not have to decide between it and putting food on the table or a roof over one's head. The issue is simply being able to go to the doctor if you aren't feeling well without worrying whether there is enough money in the bank to cover such a visit.

[Bonhomme Richard]

3. Is there something about hip replacements?

Every time, and I mean every time, there is any discussion about Canada's health care system versus our system the subject of hip replacement comes up. Is there one guy in Canada that had to wait and now he is the poster boy? Is hip replacement the scourge of the medical field?
Honest to God, read any article and hip replacement will be the reason they will give to prove that our systems is the tops.
Of course the reality is that if you don't have the money you won't get one here period.

[babylonsister]

4. I think hip replacements fall into a gray area. It's not something

one needs to 'survive' and it happens more with elderly people. I know of a family in England who's mum had to wait for months to have it done until some Euros crossed palms, then it was expedited. In fact, the woman who sent me that e-mail-her mil had to wait til money talked.

[Bonhomme Richard]

7. I think that is why they keep using it.

Because it is not life threatening and can wait without too great a consequence.

[eagler]

6. The House voted down the FAIRNESS DOCTRINE this morning

so it's a sure bet you won't be hearing anything positive about it over the airwaves. Anyone tries and they will be "rosied".