Canadian Supreme Court shows some common health-care sense

[DesertFox]

CLIFFORD KRAUSS
June 10, 2005
NY Slimes

TORONTO, June 9 - The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down a Quebec law banning private medical insurance in a decision that represents an acute blow to the publicly financed national health care system.

The high court stopped short of striking down the constitutionality of the country's vaunted health care system nationwide, but specialists across the legal spectrum said they expected the decision to lead to sweeping changes in the Canadian health care system.

"The language of the ruling will encourage more and more lawsuits and those suits have a greater likelihood of success in light of this judgment," said Lorne Sossin, acting dean of the University of Toronto law school.

Patrick Monahan, dean of the Osgoode Hall Law School of York University in Toronto and a well-known critic of the national health care system, was even more emphatic about the import of the decision. "They are going to have to change the fundamental design of the system," he said. "They will have to build in an element of timely care or otherwise allow the development of a private medical system."

The Canadian health care system provides free doctor's services that are paid for by taxes. The system has generally been strongly supported by the public, and is broadly identified with the Canadian national character. Canada is the only industrialized county that outlaws privately financed purchases of core medical services.

But in recent years patients have been forced to wait longer for diagnostic tests and elective surgery, while the wealthy and well connected either sought care in the United States or used influence to jump medical lines.

The court ruled that the waiting lists had become so long that they violated patients' "life and personal security, inviolability and freedom" under the Quebec charter of human rights and freedoms, which covers about one-quarter of Canada's population.

More (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/10/international/americas/10canada.html?oref=login) , but you have to register.

[Webruary]

Interestingly, this ties in to the following info I got from the Edmonton Sun....Canadians are increasingly trying to jump past the queue they tied themselves in in order to get their necessary medical treatment BY HOOK or BY CROOK
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Canada has four-tiered health care (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1420945/posts)

The Edmonton Sun ^ (http://www.freerepublic.com/%5Ehttp://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Columnists/Jacobs_Mindelle/2005/06/11/1081809.html) | sat., June 11,2005 | Mindelle Jacobs


The supporters of our supposed single-tier health-care system are aghast that Thursday's Supreme Court ruling could threaten Canadians' equal access to treatment.

It is a long-held myth, of course, that there is no queue-jumping in this country. Most Canadians have no special privileges when it comes to receiving care, but some do. Military personnel, the RCMP, prisoners and workers' compensation claimants don't fall under the medicare umbrella.

So while the typical Canadian waits and waits for a diagnostic test or surgery, the members of these groups are entitled to speedy access. All of them are exempt from the Canada Health Act.

I'm not suggesting that certain groups shouldn't be entitled to faster treatment. If our soldiers and cops had to wait as long as ordinary folks for care, Canada would fall short in both the peacekeeping and policing arenas.

It irks me that a prisoner can get quicker specialist consultations or surgery than law-abiding Canadians, but that's the law. Go bark to your MP about it.

Just last week, you may recall, a New Brunswick man who told police in Toronto he was planning a shooting rampage was jailed for three years. He wasn't actually going to kill anyone. The 44-year-old man, who had no prior criminal record, just wanted heart surgery. And he got it quickly while in custody.

Yes, he resorted to drastic measures to jump the queue, but people desperate for treatment will do extraordinary things. Some spend $50,000 to get surgery abroad.

Injured workers don't have to wait, though. Last year, a Workers' Compensation Board claimant in Alberta wrote us about his experience. "The average person waits, what, months or years for an MRI? I waited two days," he wrote in a letter to the editor.

He only waited 12 days for back surgery, he added. "Only a fool would believe we all get the same treatment."

The myth lives on, however. "We're not going to have a two-tier health-care system in this country," Prime Minister Paul Martin declared Thursday.

We've probably got a four-tier system, quips Nadeem Esmail, senior health policy analyst with the Fraser Institute. The first tier comprises those who are wealthy enough to go abroad for timely care, he says.

The second is made up of the aforementioned special population groups - military, RCMP, prisoners and WCB claimants. I suppose you could include professional athletes in that tier. They have private insurance and don't have to wait in line.

People in the third tier have pull or influence - they know a doctor or have a friend on the hospital board, says Esmail.

In the fourth tier are average Canadians who need care but have no way of expediting the process.


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