Canada Enters US Health Care Debate??

Say what? Oh, I get it. Our heath care system sux. So, if we can help make the US system much worse, relatively speaking tha's a gain for us!! What else explains this inappropriate bit of meddling in the US system? An interest in importing below standard pharmaceuticals, perhaps?

Canadian Democrats supportive of their country’s universal health care program are soliciting donations to send their leader to Washington to meet with “Obama Democrats” to strategize about implementing a similar system.

A fundraising appeal mailed to supporters from Anne McGrath, president of Canada’s New Democrats, says: “There’s a battle over universal health care happening in the United States -- and your New Democrats are a part of it. I hope you will lend your support.”

Yeah, great.

“I survived a brain tumor,” says Shona Holmes, of Waterton, Canada, for AFP’s Patients United Now campaign. “But if I had relied on my government for health care, I’d be dead. I am a Canadian citizen and as my health care grew worse my government health care system told me I had to wait six months so see a specialist. In six months I would have died. … I’m here today because I was able to drive to the U.S. where I received world-class treatment. Government-run health care isn’t the answer, and it sure isn’t free.”

Comments

[LOL]

Whats so bad about this? If they're going to change the system, might as well closely study all of the alternatives.

[IslamoLlama]

Ah! Canadians!

"-- “I survived a brain tumor,” says Shona Holmes, of Waterton, Canada, for AFP’s Patients United Now campaign. “But if I had relied on my government for health care, I’d be dead. I am a Canadian citizen and as my health care grew worse my government health care system told me I had to wait six months so see a specialist. In six months I would have died. … I’m here today because I was able to drive to the U.S. where I received world-class treatment. Government-run health care isn’t the answer, and it sure isn’t free.” --"

I see your Canadian horror story and raise you two American horror stories:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/11/opinion/11krugman.html
"-- Not long ago, a young Ohio woman named Trina Bachtel, who was having health problems while pregnant, tried to get help at a local clinic.

Unfortunately, she had previously sought care at the same clinic while uninsured and had a large unpaid balance. The clinic wouldn’t see her again unless she paid $100 per visit — which she didn’t have.

Eventually, she sought care at a hospital 30 miles away. By then, however, it was too late. Both she and the baby died.

You may think that this was an extreme case, but stories like this are common in America. --"

http://www.michaelmoore.com/sicko/news/article.php?id=11105
"-- Asheville – Paxten Mitchell will get the treatment that could save his life, but it may cost his parents their home and leave them in debt for the rest of their lives.

Paxten, 3, has acute lymphoblastic leukemia, called ALL. But the type he has, hypodiploid, is very rare and doesn’t always respond to the most common treatments. When he relapsed in January, his parents, Robert and Amy, were told there was little more they could do.

Robert Mitchell, an Asheville firefighter, said he was grateful for all the help and compassion the family had gotten at Mission Hospitals and from friends at First Baptist Church and the Asheville Fire Department.

“I knew the doctors had done all they could, so we had made the decision to take him home,” he said.

But then his doctors heard from doctors at Duke University Medical Center about a treatment protocol that has proved effective in cases like Paxten’s. The Mitchells agreed to go ahead with it, but the company that administers the city’s self-insurance plan refused to pay for it.

Amy Mitchell called Primary Physician Care, which is based in Charlotte, and spoke to the company president, but the claim was still refused. --"

We can go back and forth like this all day, if you like. I'll take "wait six months" over "claim denied: screw off and die" any day.

[nina]

you quoting from michael moore is like the david duke quoting from kkk journal. You can modify a system without changing it's main characteristics and advantages. The whole world wants to come here for treatment. Next time u r sick (I think you already are) Cuba is just a flight a way. Ask castro, he almost died when they messed up his colon re-anastomosis.

[IslamoLlama]

"-- you quoting from michael moore is like the david duke quoting from kkk journal. --"

I'm quoting from a link to the Ashenville Citizen Times, which is like David Duke reading from the yellow pages.

"-- The whole world wants to come here for treatment. --"

That explains the rising trend in Medical Tourism.

http://health.usnews.com/articles/health/2008/10/01/medical-tourism-everybodys-guide-to-affordable-world-class-medical-travel.html

"-- Last year, more than 180,000 Americans packed their bags and headed overseas for nearly every imaginable type of medical treatment: tummy tucks in Brazil, heart valve replacements in Thailand, hip resurfacing surgeries in India, addiction recovery in Antigua, fertility diagnosis and treatments in South Africa, thalassotherapy in Hungary, or restorative dentistry in Mexico. --"

"-- Next time u r sick (I think you already are) Cuba is just a flight a way. --"

Sadly, due to the US travel embargo, it is no less than two flights away and puts an individual at risk of losing his passport. Perhaps the brave Red Warriors in Congress are just trying to protect us from Medical Communism, and thank god for that.

But, as I'm not a Cuban citizen, I don't think I'd be entitled to free health care coverage anyway. Besides, wouldn't it make more sense if I just traveled to the oppressive Soviet controlled state of Canada? Or England? Or France? Or Spain? Or Sweden? Or Germany? Or Japan? Or South Korea?

[Jake]

This is a ridiculous exercise - citing individual anecdotes proves absolutely nothing, for either side - but IslamoLama - in the case cited in the original post, "wait six months" would have apparently been the same as "screw off and die." And in your first case, if the woman couldn't survive a 30 mile trip, again, "wait six months" would certainly have been "screw off and die." Anddddd, in your second case, sounds like "wait six months" would ALSO have resulted in "screw off and die."

[viktor silo]

Canada Enters US Health Care Debate??

To answer your question: Canada has not entered the US Health Care debate.

"Canadian Democrats supportive of their country’s universal health care program are soliciting donations to send their leader to Washington to meet with “Obama Democrats” to strategize about implementing a similar system." This sentence by Ms. Carpenter is misleading.

The New Democratic Party (NDP) is a purely socialist party that has never won a federal election in Canada. It always comes in a very distant third.

Conflating America's Democratic Party with Canada's New Democratic Party is humbug. For the time being at least.

Canada's health care system delivers excellent health care for the vast majority of Canadians. It is true that there are horror stories within the system. But they are, by far, the exception. I could find just as many horror stories within the American system. In fact, I would expect to find ten times as many horror stories. This is because America is ten times as big.

If you want to oppose a government health care system in the U.S., do not fall into the trap of saying that Canada does not provide good health care. You will lose that debating point every time.

What you need to point out in debates is the cost of the Canadian system. That is the system's Achilles heel. The Canadian Health Care system vacuums up all the dough. I do not have the figures in front of me but I am under the impression that 1/3 of all revenues go into health care.

Canada does not have to support a military system like the U.S. and it has a lot of revenue from being a net exporter of energy. These two differences from the U.S. are the only reason Canada can presently fund the system.

However, Canada's system will go broke as the boomers age and make increased demands upon it. There will be major modifications to the system over the next two decades. Publically funded medicare will disappear in 20 years although it will be still be called a publc system as a fig leaf to satisfy the left.

[IslamoLlama]

"-- And in your first case, if the woman couldn't survive a 30 mile trip, again, "wait six months" would certainly have been "screw off and die." Anddddd, in your second case, sounds like "wait six months" would ALSO have resulted in "screw off and die." --"

Except that, in the first case, she had begun treatment and was then denied. And in the second case, he had begun treatment and was then denied. And, in the original case, had she been unable to fork over the thousands of dollars necessary to see a specialist, she'd have still died.

You seem to be confusing the haves with the have-nots. Brain cancer specialists don't pay for themselves. Neither of the American patients could have afforded the treatment that the Canadian patient was apparently able to handle out of pocket. And had the Canadian patient been using American insurance, there's a good chance her claim would have been denied.

An American public option - which is what Obama is proposing - wouldn't shut down the specialist the Canadian patient attended. It would simply provide better coverage to those forced to live under the heel of insurance giants.

[JustOneMan]

IslamoLlama

Funny how King Barry is not addressing the legal whores in his quest to lower healthcare costs. Defensive medicine, medical malpractice lawsuits and liability insurace are responsible for 20% or more of health care costs....where is the tort reform?

It wont happen because trial lawyers have donated millions to the DumboCraps!

[lala]

"And had the Canadian patient been using American insurance, there's a good chance her claim would have been denied."

Making stuff up is so much fun.

[North Dallas Thirty]

Let's see, what was it that IslamoLlama said?

"Except that, in the first case, she had begun treatment and was then denied. And in the second case, he had begun treatment and was then denied. And, in the original case, had she been unable to fork over the thousands of dollars necessary to see a specialist, she'd have still died."

At the end of the quote:

"In his column on Friday, Paul Krugman discussed an anecdote told by Hillary Clinton about a woman in Ohio who supposedly lost her newborn child, and then her life, because of bills run up when she did not have health insurance. Mr. Krugman relied on early news accounts of the incident, but later accounts, including one from The Columbus Dispatch, show that those bills did not lead to loss of care."

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/11/opinion/11krugman.html?_r=1

Oopsie.

[nina]

Islamogoat,
Oh they'll take care of you in Cuba alright. They take all people. The typical hospital in Cuba has no linens or pillow. You bring it. Also don't forget to bring aspirins or tylenol because they have none. If you break a leg make sure you break it early in the day. The typical orthopaedic surgeon gets to send one person a day to get an xray. If your wife is having a baby bring some rum ,no epidural or iv meds. If you get cancer unless it can be surgically removed you are dead unless your Miami family can send the chemo to you. The same with diabetes or any chronic illnesses. Dialysis is only available for the elite.
Michael Moore got to see the elite's hospitals and staged clinics. The fat redneck has made millions with idiots like you who not only see his movies but quote him like he is some expert. From what I see of him the only expertise he has is moving his mouth to talk and eat. There is a silver lining to socialized medicine,asses like you can't sue the goverment. Cheers!!
Now go back to the HP .

[lala]

My daughter spent a year at school in Moscow. She got sick and called and asked me what to do as she couldn't get a doctor. She went to the emergency room there thinking it was like any other emerg room.
First, she waited an hour in the ambulance outside the hospital. Then, when she went in two people at a desk looked at her and gave her a glass of water (which she couldn't drink, foreigners have to have bottled water) and two aspirin. A twelve year old boy led her to her room and asked her for a cigarette. She was given a sheet to make her bed. She decided she wasn't so sick after all and tried to leave. They wouldn't let her, they locked up her clothes. They told her they were keeping her there for 7 days. After much crying and a call to her university they reluctantly released her. It was called hospital number 12.

[Theresa]

My fiance has BC/BS and after many phone calls and finally finding a dermatologist in the Balt. Wash. metro area who accepted new patients we still couldn't get the suspected malignant tumor to be looked at before 3 months time. There was NO ONE in the area that could see him before 3 months! Sure enough he was dx'd with malignant skin cancer. Don't tell me that America can't figure out a way to give everyone affordable Universal healthcare with limited waiting times. We're better than that.

[lala]

I'm in New York, I can get a doctor either the same day or in a few days. Do you want the Canada system where first you have to have a primary doctor before you can see a specialist? And in some parts of Canada there is a waiting list for a primary. No primary means no specialist. The big O already realizes the US is short on GPs.

[SacTownMan]

Lame-O,

Sometimes the bullshit spills out of you so bad I'd swear you were running from a matador!

You do nothing to furthur the discussion here. You are the reincarnation of Harpo!

What the hell do you know about delivering healthcare?

Only you would be stupid enough to link Michael Moore. There is simply no way to carry on a rational conversation about healthcare with someone that thinks a POS like Moore is an expert on American healthcare! You need to get off the Kool-Aid!!

Unlike our resident troll I'm using a non-moonbat link to help those rational thinking posters that may be interested in some real issues about that wonderful Canadian system:

http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2008/08/21/ct-mri.html

I have posted before about a vast majority of the Head and Neck cancer patients that I work with that receive a PET scan prior to treatment.

These patients are simulated on a special CT scanner and immobilized. WITHIN 3 DAYS they are then scanned at another site using a diagnostic PET/CT scanner. This information is fed into a treatment planning computer that presents the doctor with a 3-D image of the tumor that combines the benefits of the CT scan (great for the bony structure), MRI (soft tissue) and PET (tumor activity)

PET stands for Positron Emission Tomography. In a nut shell a radioactive gluclose die is used that is given to the patient. The patient is then placed in a quite room for one hour to allow the cluclose to be absorbed by the body. Cancer cells are hungry for this gluclose and those areas "light" on under the PET scan.

http://www.radiologyinfo.org/en/info.cfm?PG=pet

The point of this is to sharply define the tumor so that the doctor can spare healthy cells and kill the cancer cells. The problem with external beam radiation treatment is that some areas near the tumor are adversly and permanently damaged in order to eliminate the tumor. By tightening the margins around the tumor using the data from these fused PET/CT/MRI images there are incredible benefits to the patient. One of the worst side affect of treating the head and neck area is the loss of salivatory function from damage to the salivatory glands. In the past these patients would spend the rest of their lives unable to generate saliva. Our patients have had dramatic improvement maintaining salivatory function after treatment.

So now to connect this all together understand that with the shortage of these scanners in Canada it is unlikely that a similar head and neck patient treated there will be as fortunate as our patients are. The Canadian patient is simply less likely to be able to live the rest of their lives normally, disease free and do something as simple as being able to continue to keep their mouth wet.

Other cancers such as prostate, breast and inoperable lung tumors treated in America will have similarly better outcomes then their counterparts in the rest of the world.

This is only one example of the quality difference between the US and Canada. I witness dozens of other examples like this every day. American quality in the best in the world, period, end of story!! Those that would argue otherwise need to just STFU!! They don't speak from ANY real world experience and simply parrot others in an effort to come across as actually knowing something about the subject.

Listening to idiots like Lame-O constantly talking about shit they know absolutley nothing about is beyond the pale!

It brings back memories of Harpo and helps to remind me that the Bob-O's and Lame-O's of the world come across as whiny, unsucessful, unhappy and angry little cyberbullies!

You should just stick to racing to be the first to respond to Dan's posts.

That way we get the stupid out of the way at the beginning and the adults can try and carry on a conversation without having the little poodle humping our leg!

What a tool!!

[WAHOO WILLIE]

"Robert Mitchell, an Asheville firefighter, said he was grateful for all the help and compassion the family had gotten at Mission Hospitals and from friends at First Baptist Church and the Asheville Fire Department."

Wow and living in the most liberal city in NC. Guess Local 865 IAFF doesn't have the same insurance the rest of AFL-CIO does, nor does he avail himself of state employee insurance. He must not be a member of any of the other fire-rescue associations in the state either. Now having known people who actually are poor I've never heard of any turned away from Duke or ECU or hell, even UNC in the "Peoples Republic of Chapel Hill". But then having been in the business of getting people to these medical facilities doesn't make me near as smart as Michael (if it it aint true I'll make it up) Moore.

[lala]

Willie, here is the part that makes no sense -

"The Mitchells agreed to go ahead with it, but the company that administers the city’s self-insurance plan refused to pay for it."

The admin only does what the self-insurer tells them to do. If the company or municipality has limits on its insurance then it is up to you, the worker, to make sure you have catastrophic coverage. Like the person who waited 3 months to see a doctor for his cancerous tumor, it is up to you to take care of yourself.

[WAHOO WILLIE]

"Like the person who waited 3 months to see a doctor for his cancerous tumor, it is up to you to take care of yourself."

Strange thhat one, here I live in hicksville, USA....down south where we need folks from Boston to tell us "how it should be done". Yet, if I call my doc Monday with a big ole tumor on my face, they'll try to fit me in but if I dont want to wait all day, I can get a tuesday appt. Now if the tumor is all red and has claws & teeth coming out of it I can go to anyone of 4-5 "doc in a box" emergency places.....I dont do emergency rooms without chest pains. I thought the folks in da big cities had it so much better than us poor rednecks but I guess it's a war zone out there.

[lala]

It sounds made up, Willie. Who, thinking they have a cancerous tumor, would wait 3 months to see a doctor?

[mark l.]

trina bachtel-

"She went to the hospital, and the hospital told her she needed $100 up front, which she didn’t have of course didn’t make a lot of money . So they had billed her a couple of times for it. And uh, after getting pregnant she went back, like I say, she went back again, they told her she needed $100 she didn’t have . So they refused to see her because she had a bill and stuff and been there before. So she went to another local hospital . They seen her and stopped her labor and told her to come back in two days. Well before she got back within those two days her baby died."

http://www.noquarterusa.net/blog/2008/04/07/the-real-trina-bachtel-story/

lama-it appears you, kanye west, and krugman are two of the biggest suckers in the world.
any articles on how many babies were raped in the superdome during katrina?

The very first clue that you should have looked for:
is your story a durable one? why isn't this woman on a 30 second clip, telling her horror story?

[WAHOO WILLIE]

Lala: It just gets me that when there are legitimate shortfalls to our system, and there are many, rather than discuss and try to fix those people like that fat slob Moore sensationalize the most mundane stories. I guess they figure we actually do need people dying in the streets to wake people up......maybe we do, but lets at least find people who are really dying in the streets instead of making them up.

[lala]

Willie, I have a friend who has some very bad diseases. She owns a mortgage-free house worth about 400,000.00, has another 100 thou in the bank, gets a pension and social security. She was always complaining about how much she had to pay for supplemental insurance and her drugs. So I had some suggestions like don't take the drugs since they're too expensive. Then I'll die, she said. I said, oh, then sell your house and get an apartment and you'll be able to afford them, or take a reverse mortgage. After all, you don't expect me to pay for your drugs, do you? Now I don't hear any more complaining. It's funny with people, they think medical care should be free but they'll spend and spend on junk they don't need. It's the same when gas goes up, people spend 6 dollars for one bottle of beer and that's ok but a gallon of gas at 4 dollars is a crime against humanity.