--- Jon Pruente jdpruente@gmail.com wrote:
THe Canadians have no idea why Americans are so enamoured of their health care system. If a Canadian needs anything more than basic care or some sort of specialty care, and they have the money, they travel across the border to the U.S. and pay an American doctor to fix them.
And if an uninsured American needs basic care, they don't go *anywhere*, or they go help shut down their local hospital by getting extremely expensive E.R. care for which they can't afford to pay. The millions of uninsured people think that the Canadian system of health care is at least better than the U.S. system, since in Canada you might have to wait for a specialist (but not for basic care). Here in the U.S. you might never get basic care no matter how long you wait.
The rich in the U.S. are already discovering that a $132,000 heart bypass operation in the U.S. (thats the operation only, not including tests, hospital stay, X-Rays, etc.), only costs $10,000 in India, and that includes roundtrip plane tickets to India, tests, hospital stay, X-rays, pretty much anything else the primary doctor thinks is necessary, and a side trip to the Taj Mahal. And your Indian doctor either received his medical degree in the U.S. or trained from someone who received his medical degree in the U.S. People with money will always be able to find a system of health care which is better (for them) than the one they are in themselves.
And, because the Canadian pay system, the better doctors tend to move to the US to work...
There's a reason for the Canadian doctor "exodus" which has nothing to do with the "Canadian pay system": Canada requires a two-year residency in order to get a license to practice medicine, and those are in short supply in Canada. Canada does recognize residencies performed in American hospitals, so nearly a thousand new doctors a year tromp over the border to get their residency requirement. This gets picked up by anyone opposed to single-payer health care as "they're leaving to come here because we're better." Meanwhile our U.S. doctors leave medical school in one state and search for residencies in another state, and that isn't counted as "the Massachusetts health care system must be worse than the one in Illinois!"
Quite a few doctors come back to Canada because they are appalled at a health care system which refuses care to people if they cannot pay, and won't even let people, who cannot pay, wait for a specialist.
The "well Canadians have to wait a long time for a specialist so they hate their system" argument rankles with me because I need a specialist and I am uninsured. In Canada I might have to wait six months. Here I will die before I get the specialist, because I will never be able to save up the money for the office visit with the specialist, let alone the tests.
But this is getting even further off topic.
I agree, I just couldn't let these two stereotypes of Canadian and U.S. health care stand without pointing out why they aren't completely true.
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