Canada's premier medical journal has weighed into the fracas over U.S. healthcare reform with blunt words: Partisan attacks and horror stories are threatening a "precious opportunity" to give Americans the healthcare they deserve.
These tales "are so absurd and full of fantasy that they would be laughable -- if not for the fact that many Americans believe them," the editors of the Canadian Medical Association Journal said.
On the other hand, the skill and talent of U.S. healthcare professionals -- and the wealth of the country -- could give Americans unparalleled healthcare "if they find the courage to embrace change."
"Lamentably, in the current partisan circus playing out on Capitol Hill, analysis is short and sophistry ... is long," they said.
The Canadian healthcare system is not perfect, they argued, but it gives much better results than the U.S. system, citing 2006 statistics from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development:
* Average American life expectancy is 78.1 years, compared with 80.7 in Canada -- nearly three years shorter.
* U.S. infant mortality is 6.7 deaths per thousand live births, compared with 5.0 in Canada.
* The U.S. economy spends -- "or increasingly, borrows" -- more on healthcare than Canada's, at 16% versus 10.1% of the economy.
* Despite the extra spending, Americans see their doctors less often than do Canadians -- 3.8 visits a year versus 5.8.
"The inescapable truth is that, compared to Canada, America is achieving poor value for money from its healthcare system, and that is killing Americans," the journal's editors said.
"We cannot condemn strongly enough," they added, "the intellectual dishonesty (LIES) of the lobbyists and politicians whose distortions of Canada's health system camouflage their appalling rejection of reform for uninsured and underinsured Americans."
The editorial noted that Canada spends $156 billion U.S. a year to provide medical coverage for all its 32 million people -- fewer than America's 47 million uninsured.
At that rate, the editors argued, the Obama administration's estimated $100 million a year to cover the uninsured is a "screaming bargain."
The issue of rationing care is also a nonstarter, the journal's editors said. "The only cruelty in rationing healthcare comes in doing it the wrong way," they said.
The wrong way, they argued, is to have private insurers that refuse to cover people with preexisting health conditions. "That is the worst kind of rationing, aimed mercilessly at those who need medical care most," they said.
In contrast, Canada aims to ration medically futile treatments -- residents are not denied coverage for preexisting conditions, and there is no cutoff age, they said.
"Where we occasionally make mistakes is in rationing new treatments that in hindsight prove to be useful, not futile," the editors said.
The editorial admitted that Canadians do face waiting lists for healthcare.
"But that does not mean Canadians routinely die waiting for tests and operations," they argued, "because the lists are for elective procedures, such as joint replacement surgery, and not for emergency or life-saving care."
The journal noted that a common feature of American life -- staying in a job to keep health benefits -- does not exist in Canada. Finally, the editorial noted, Canada's healthcare system had its origin in the western province of Saskatchewan in the 1940s, when health bills forced many families into bankruptcy.
"That same tragedy is replaying in America, where more than half of personal bankruptcies are medically related, the editorial said -- a number that is likely to climb as health costs rise, the population ages, and the U.S. dollar loses ground as a reserve currency.
Primary source: Canadian Medical Association Journal
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One in nine trained-in-Canada doctors is practising medicine in the United States, says a study published in Tuesday's issue of the Canadian Medical Association Journal.
What the survey found was that 49% of doctors in the U.S. plan to either stop their practice or cut back over the next 3 years.
Patients experienced not only long wait times between referral and treatment, but access to diagnostic technologies was delayed across Canada: median 5.5 weeks for a CT scan, 12.3 weeks for MRI and 3.4 weeks for ultrasound.
Then tack on wait times for surgery. Light won't like me to report the truth.
My relatives in Manitoba have homes in Texas and split summers and winters.
Quote:
Some of Sorbie’s patients have waited as long as 18 months for joint replacement surgery. And specific orthopaedic specialties, such as foot and ankle, have even longer wait times. In Toronto, patients wait a minimum of one year to see a foot and ankle consultant, Sorbie said.
Truth is with the nasty wait times, most patients come out after surgery permanently crippled. Get an electric scooter.
We don't have millions of docs but have thousands from Canada.
Quote:
The total number of doctors in practice was 836,000. Of these 183,000 were non-Americans trained abroad. Six countries supplied 49% of these 183,000 (in descending order): India, Philippines, Pakistan, Canada, China, and the foreign Soviet Union. In 2004 40,888 India trained doctors were in practice in the United States. That made up 5% of all practicing MDs and 22% of all non-American foreign trained doctors
Canada's premier medical journal has weighed into the fracas over U.S. healthcare reform with blunt words: Partisan attacks and horror stories are threatening a "precious opportunity" to give Americans the healthcare they deserve.
These tales "are so absurd and full of fantasy that they would be laughable -- if not for the fact that many Americans believe them," the editors of the Canadian Medical Association Journal said.
On the other hand, the skill and talent of U.S. healthcare professionals -- and the wealth of the country -- could give Americans unparalleled healthcare "if they find the courage to embrace change."
"Lamentably, in the current partisan circus playing out on Capitol Hill, analysis is short and sophistry ... is long," they said.
The Canadian healthcare system is not perfect, they argued, but it gives much better results than the U.S. system, citing 2006 statistics from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development:
* Average American life expectancy is 78.1 years, compared with 80.7 in Canada -- nearly three years shorter.
* U.S. infant mortality is 6.7 deaths per thousand live births, compared with 5.0 in Canada.
* The U.S. economy spends -- "or increasingly, borrows" -- more on healthcare than Canada's, at 16% versus 10.1% of the economy.
* Despite the extra spending, Americans see their doctors less often than do Canadians -- 3.8 visits a year versus 5.8.
"The inescapable truth is that, compared to Canada, America is achieving poor value for money from its healthcare system, and that is killing Americans," the journal's editors said.
"We cannot condemn strongly enough," they added, "the intellectual dishonesty (LIES) of the lobbyists and politicians whose distortions of Canada's health system camouflage their appalling rejection of reform for uninsured and underinsured Americans."
The editorial noted that Canada spends $156 billion U.S. a year to provide medical coverage for all its 32 million people -- fewer than America's 47 million uninsured.
At that rate, the editors argued, the Obama administration's estimated $100 million a year to cover the uninsured is a "screaming bargain."
The issue of rationing care is also a nonstarter, the journal's editors said. "The only cruelty in rationing healthcare comes in doing it the wrong way," they said.
The wrong way, they argued, is to have private insurers that refuse to cover people with preexisting health conditions. "That is the worst kind of rationing, aimed mercilessly at those who need medical care most," they said.
In contrast, Canada aims to ration medically futile treatments -- residents are not denied coverage for preexisting conditions, and there is no cutoff age, they said.
"Where we occasionally make mistakes is in rationing new treatments that in hindsight prove to be useful, not futile," the editors said.
The editorial admitted that Canadians do face waiting lists for healthcare.
"But that does not mean Canadians routinely die waiting for tests and operations," they argued, "because the lists are for elective procedures, such as joint replacement surgery, and not for emergency or life-saving care."
The journal noted that a common feature of American life -- staying in a job to keep health benefits -- does not exist in Canada. Finally, the editorial noted, Canada's healthcare system had its origin in the western province of Saskatchewan in the 1940s, when health bills forced many families into bankruptcy.
"That same tragedy is replaying in America, where more than half of personal bankruptcies are medically related, the editorial said -- a number that is likely to climb as health costs rise, the population ages, and the U.S. dollar loses ground as a reserve currency.
Primary source: Canadian Medical Association Journal
.
Wow, it really sounds like those Canadians have it rough when it comes to their healthcare system. Especially compared to our utopia of healthcare here in America.
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In essentials, unity. In non-essentials, liberty. In all things, charity. Augustine
Wow, it really sounds like those Canadians have it rough when it comes to their healthcare system. Especially compared to our utopia of healthcare here in America.
It is rough. I take it you and Light have never been to canada. never used canadian healthcare. Typical misguided libs.
Posted August 17th, 2009 at 1.16pm in Health Care.
Last week we passed along the news that the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority is considering cutting more than 6,000 surgeries to make up for a $200 million budget shortfall. British Columbia Medical Association president Dr. Brian Brodie called the proposed surgical cuts “a nightmare.”
Unsurprisingly, the collapse of Canda’s government-run health care system is not confined to the West Coast. The Canadian Press reports today:
The incoming president of the Canadian Medical Association says this country’s health-care system is sick and doctors need to develop a plan to cure it.
Dr. Anne Doig says patients are getting less than optimal care and she adds that physicians from across the country - who will gather in Saskatoon on Sunday for their annual meeting - recognize that changes must be made.
“We all agree that the system is imploding, we all agree that things are more precarious than perhaps Canadians realize,” Doing said in an interview with The Canadian Press
I don't know about Canada, but America needs better health care for ALL citizens. Just not sure the new plan is any better or worse than what we already have. ALL politicians have their own agenda's on everything, sadly the people it most affects are not politicians. And our only recourse is voting and protesting peacefully.
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If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
2 Chronicles 7:14 KJV
He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? Micah 6:8 KJV
Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. 1 John 3:2 KJV
During the past 30 years, about 19,000 physicians trained in Canada have crossed the border into the United States and depleted the Canadian supply of physicians in the process, says the study, which was conducted by the AAFP's Robert Graham Center, the department of pediatrics at New York University and the department of family medicine at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario. According to "The Canadian Contribution to the U.S. Physician Workforce," in 2006, 8,162 Canadian-educated physicians were providing direct patient care in the United States. That figure accounts for about one in nine Canadian-trained physicians, which is equivalent to having two average-sized Canadian medical schools dedicated entirely to producing physicians for the United States.
Nearly half of the Canadian-educated physicians practicing in the United States graduated from three medical schools -- McGill University in Montreal, with 24.7 percent of graduates; the University of Toronto, with 15.2 percent; and the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, with 8 percent, according to the study. Canada has 17 medical schools.
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