Detroit Free Press, Sept 28th

This Canadian is tired of US media (ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX) transmitting health care falsehoods to the public. I would expect this type of malarkey from the representative of a US for-profit health care insurance company.

Furthermore the media has been no mention of the numerous Americans who are presently living abroad in countries with a private health care system in medical exile.

This Canadian would rather pay a little extra tax than the exorbitant premiums to a for-profit health insurance company. As Americans you have every freedom to fill the coffers of those aforementioned companies.

Now you all can say you know a Canadian, who along with well over 80% of the population is proud of our state of the art health care system. However I respectfully request that the media quit brow beating the remaining first world nations who all offer a single payer health care system.

Ian Montrose

Belle River, Ontario, Canada

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On a recent trip to Canada, I spent some time reading The Globe and Mail. In an article on Page A17 of the Sept. 14 issue, economist Eugene Lang and health policy adviser Philip DeMont compare the Canadian (medicare) and U.S. health care systems.

They observe that “the hysterical tone of the anti-medicare rhetoric among Republicans would make one think Canada is North Korea.” Lang and DeMont go on to discuss the “inconvenient truth” that “Canada’s approach to providing citizens with universal health insurance is superior to the U.S. model of private insurance.”

They proceed to compare the two systems using four indicators of health care efficiency: life expectancy, infant mortality, cost differences, and percentage of citizens covered. On each of these measures, Canadians enjoy clear advantages over their U.S. neighbors.

read the rest of the letter

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I just returned recently from visiting my mother in Fargo, which I do several times a year. I am an American citizen who has lived in Canada for 20 years, and I am a permanent resident teaching at the university in Regina. I am following the health reform debate, and I am bothered by the severe misrepresentation that is occurring about the Canada Health Act and ways in which a universal public health care program is being portrayed in the American media, especially in the attack ads by the opponents to reform.

I was covered from the first day I moved to Saskatchewan in August 1989 and have only used the system lightly until recently. I had a major episode involving a constricture of an artery two and a half years ago and was impressed about the quality of care that was extended to me. I was treated by first-class specialists, and I feel I was given excellent attention. I had free choice of my doctor (general practitioner), and his office was within blocks of my home. However, I have also witnessed how individuals who were severely impoverished, but am sure would have no insurance in an American context, received care in a prompt and efficient manner.

While I pay higher rates of income tax and fuel taxes, I do not pay medical insurance premiums. I have an optional supplemental insurance program for medications, dental and eye care through my employer, and there are proposals being discussed publicly in individual provinces and across Canada to see amendments to the Health Act potentially for extending future benefits to these additional services.

In an op-ed piece that appeared in the Toronto Globe and Mail (Sept. 14, A13), a number of comparisons were drawn between the health systems of Canada and the United States. With life expectancy as a basic measure of health care, a U.S. citizen will live to 77.8 years on average, while in Canada it is 80.4. American infants have a mortality rate of 6.37 per every thousand, while in Canada the rate is 5.4. Then comparing the percentage of gross national product used for health costs, Canadians spend 10 percent while Americans spend 16 percent.

While universal health care has costs, it also has efficiencies. Wait times are an ongoing challenge, but prioritized care based on severity of condition is reasonable and effective. The Canadian experience needs a balanced assessment, and a quality of life without the fear of medical shortfall speaks for itself.

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My 76-year-old sister has lived in British Columbia most of her adult life. In the past decade she has had two hip replacements and a knee replacement. She had excellent consultation, operations and after-care for each and leads a very active, productive life. She and her husband live on a retired teacher’s income. In the U.S., she would not have received the excellent care she got in Canada, nor could she afford to have those operations. She sent the following e-mail:

“I have been thinking of you so much lately as I fume about the way Canadian health care is pilloried in the American news. A recent poll showed that the number one thing people treasure in Canada is their health care system. Any health care system can be better, but coverage for all seems to be the least that a country can do for its people. I spoke to a doctor recently, a Canadian who was practicing in Colorado. He came back to Canada because he was practically going broke despite his supposedly high wages. The paperwork he had to deal with for many health providers was costing him so much time and office work that he was getting depressed. He also had to fudge on accurate information or his patients wouldn’t get coverage, which presented an ethical dilemma.”

Why is the U.S. the last “civilized country” on earth to deny health care for all? It is insane and immoral. Stories of Canadians (wealthy) crossing the border for better care in the U.S. are hypocritical lies. More Montanans are going north for health care and prescription drugs because of our failed system.

Bob Ream

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