Canadian Health Care

Canadians don't come here merely for vacations.  See what can happen when you have "free" health care.

News alert:  there is no free lunch, and no free health care.

Comments

[Greg]

See what happens when people cannot afford health care.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/08/16/wife.killed.ap/index.html

or

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=3485812

One can certainly find horror stories no matter where they look. The whole point is which system is better, and which system helps and takes care of more people. Now the answer may not be Canada's system, but to put your head in the sand and deny there is a problem is juvenile.

We have a serious problem, a problem you constant fail to address. You have never address the growing numbers of Americans who are without health care. Just as you never address the our high infant mortality rate. You never even address the competitive disadvantage US industries face with their higher health cost as to others in this competitive global environment. If the discussion goes to who can find the most horrific stories then I bet I would win, but in the end what would I win? How would any of that deal with the problem that the United States the wealthiest country in the world and the leader in medicine has the 37 best rated health care system in the world. If you are happy with that, and see nothing wrong with that, then we have no room to debate. If you care to see that improve and to see more get access to the health care I feel we all need, then let's have a intelligent discussion. But stories like this only cloud up the issue and leaves out any intelligent debate.

[Peg]

I agree with you that we need significant changes in our health care system. That I never discuss this, nor talk about alternatives is utterly wrong. I have done so multiple times; here is but one:

http://moot.typepad.com/what_if/2006/02/yep_me_too.html

[Greg]

I did not realize I had to go back a little over year to find a post in which an alternative had been proposed. Can I ask do stories such as the one you just highlight add anything to the discussion or are they used to blur the issue?

[Peg]

Greg - I thought I had commented on Professor Herzlinger since that post, since I heard her speak a couple of months ago in Minneapolis.

You may think that this Harvard professor "blurs the issues". I do not.

More on the professor:

http://www.manhattan-institute.org/healthcare/