A fake email from a fake Canadian has been circulating in cyberspace. It purports to help we Americans understand the problems inherent in mandated universal coverage by exposing the dark and dirty secrets of Canada’s dysfunctional health care system.
The complete debunking is provided below, but here are the key points
— each province has slightly different plans, with different funding mechanisms.
–These may or MAY NOT require payment of premiums or copays.
–Illegal immigrants are NOT covered by most provinces.
–Waiting lists have been declining for most services in most areas for the last several years.
–Most provincial plans cover almost all drugs, with some (relatively minor) exceptions.
Here’s the complete debunk of the faux Canadian email.
“This was sent from Canada to a friend in the States.
I saw on the news up here in Canada where Hillary Clinton introduced her new health care plan. Something similar to what we have in Canada. I also heard that Michael Moore was raving about the health care up here in Canada in his latest movie. As your friend and someone who lives with the Canada health care plan I thought I would give you some facts about this great medical plan that we have in Canada.
1. The health care plan in Canada is not free. We pay a premium every month of $96. for Shirley and I to be covered. Sounds great eh. What they don’t tell you is how much we pay in taxes to keep the health care system afloat. I am personally in the 55% tax bracket. Yes 55% of my earnings go to taxes. A large portion of that and I am not sure of the exact amount goes directly to health care our #1 expense.
Debunk
False. Like the US, Canada has a graduated income tax system, with Federal taxes starting at 15.5% and going up to 29% for income over $129,000. Each province has their own tax rates, with the max rate of 17.95% for income over $111,000 in Nova Scotia. Thus, the maximum payable tax rate, which only applies to income over $129k, is 46.95%.
But our ‘Canadian’ does not live in Nova Scotia – because that province does not charge ‘premiums’ for health coverage.
Three provinces require individuals to pay premiums – British Columbia, Alberta, and Ontario. For example, Ontario citizens “with salaries above CN$20,000 must pay an annual health care premium ranging from $300-$900. Funding for medicare in Ontario also comes in part from a dedicated Employer Health Tax (EHT) that ranges from 0.98%-1.95% of employer payroll. Eligible employers are exempted from EHT on the first $400,000 of payroll.
The maximum tax rate (NOT the effective rate, because income is taxed at graduated rates) this ‘Canadian’ could pay is 43.7% – the combined Federal and BC income tax rates.
Oh, and any citizen who cannot afford premiums is still covered.
2. I would not classify what we have as health care plan, it is more like a health diagnosis system. You can get into to see a doctor quick enough so he can tell you “yes indeed you are sick or you need an operation” but now the challenge becomes getting treated or operated on. We have waiting lists out the ying yang some as much as 2 years down the road.
Debunk
False. Waiting times for many services and provider types are comparable to those in the US for folks with insurance.
3. Rather than fix what is wrong with you the usual tactic in Canada is to prescribe drugs. Have a pain here is a drug to take- not what is causing the pain and why. No time for checking you out because it is more important to move as many patients thru as possible each hour for Government re-imbursement.
Debunk
If this is true, this is different from the US exactly how?
4. Many Canadians do not have a family Doctor.
Debunk
Not exactly – ‘many’ is less than 20% of the population.
5. Don’t require emergency treatment as you may wait for hours in the emergency room waiting for treatment.
Debunk
And you may not (see ER waiting times in previous Debunks). If you do wait for treatment in an ER, that is different from the US exactly how?
6. Shirley’s dad cut his hand on a power saw a few weeks back and it required that his hand be put in a splint – to our surprise we had to pay $125. for a splint because it is not covered under health care plus we have to pay $60. for each visit for him to check it out each week.
Debunk
Why is our Canadian paying for his father in law’s splint and for visits? He isn’t. There is no requirement for a $60 copay in any provincial system. None.
7. Shirley’s cousin was diagnosed with a heart blockage. Put on a waiting list . Died before he could get treatment.
Debunk – highly unlikely, although this is a classic strawman – we don’t know if he died in a car accident or shot himself in the head or had a heart attack. We do know that median wait times for times for angioplasty and bypass range from 3 to 40 days, with priority cases seen first (there’s lots of good data on this at the linked reference).
8. Government allots so many operations per year. When that is done no more operations, unless you go to your local newspaper and plead your case and embarrass the government then money suddenly appears.
Debunk
False false false. There is no such quota system.
9)The Government takes great pride in telling us how much more they are increasing the funding for health care but waiting lists never get shorter. Government just keeps throwing money at the problem but it never goes away. But they are good at finding new ways to tax us, but they don’t call it a tax anymore it is now a user fee.
Debunk
Waiting lists are getting shorter for many services. In addition, provinces are categorizing patients by priority; yes some don’t get an MRI for six months, but these are the lowest priority patients; top priority patients typically receive care within a few days of the request for an appointment – see previous debunks on this myth.
10. A friend needs an operation for a blockage in her leg but because she is a smoker they will not do it. Despite paying into the health care system all these years. My friend is 65 years old. Now there is talk that maybe we should not treat fat and obese people either because they are a drain on the health care system. Let me see now, what we want in Canada is a health care system for healthy people only. That should reduce our health care costs.
Debunk
The libertarian in me (I confess, when it comes to stuff like this it does reveal itself) says she got what she deserves. Why this is an issue for libertarian-leaning folks is a mystery to me; isn’t this good as it encourages personal responsibility? Shouldn’t the faux Canadian author like this socialized attack on moral hazard?
Alas, it would be nice, if it were true. It isn’t. “They” have to provide care to everyone, with priority given to the most critical cases. Perhaps this ‘blockage’ is simply varicose veins, and therefore cosmetic?
11. Forget getting a second opinion, what you see is what you get.
Debunk
False. Provincial health plans typically allow insureds to seek consultations from specialists without restrictions. Depending on the insured’s acuity, there may or may not be a long wait for an appointment.
12. I can spend what money I have left after taxes on booze, cigarettes, junk food and anything else that could kill me but I am not allowed by law to spend my money on getting an operation I need because that would be jumping the queue. I must wait my turn except if I am a hockey player or athlete then I can get looked at right away. Go figger. Where else in the world can you spend money to kill yourself but not allowed to spend money to get healthy.
Debunk
Our faux Canadian is really getting desperate here – and if he was a real Canadian, he certainly wouldn’t object to medical care for a hockey player. Yes, technically it is a violation for an individual to pay for a service covered by the health care system – but some Canadians do anyway, with no real penalty. As to the hockey player, if they get hurt in a game, of course they get treatment.
13. Oh did I mention that immigrants are covered automatically at tax payer expense having never contributed a dollar to the system and pay no premiums.
Debunk
These folks just love to play the immigrant card. Immigrants are NOT covered automatically. Several provinces have mandatory waiting periods before coverage is provided, with the effective waiting period as long as 2.1 years
14. Oh yeh we now give free needles to drug users to try and keep them healthy. Wouldn’t want a sickly druggie breaking into your house and stealing your things. But people with diabetes who pay into the health care system have to pay for their needles because it is not covered but the health care system.
Debunk
Here our ‘Canadian’s’ bias is revealed – his rant is clearly ideologically based – note the comment on drug needles which reflects a complete lack of understanding of the purpose for and economics of needle exchange programs.
I send this out not looking for sympathy but as the election looms in the states you will be hearing more and more about universal health care down there and the advocates will be pointing to Canada. I just want to make sure that you hear the truth about health care up here and have some food for thought and informed questions to ask when broached with this subject.
Step wisely and don’t make the same mistakes we have.”
Like believing all the crap circulating on the web.
Ok, maybe it is fiction, maybe only a tiny part of it is fact.
Regardless, why would I ever want to entrust the federal government to handle my healthcare? This is the same government that gave us Vietnam, Iraq, the War on Poverty (which has been going on for 40 years), the No Child Left Behind act, pork barrel spending, the IRS, bloated Medicare and Medicaid, the Department of Education (in 1980 a $14 billion dollar budget, now over $88 billion), McCain/Feingold and so many cost overrun programs that it is difficult to even begin to list them.
Can we begin to imagine how the Senate and House members will attach special interest dollars to big time campaign donors? We can bet that the hospital corporations will be in the front of the line with contributions in order to get some special $ concession(s). The AMA and others will be right behind them.
Why do so many of use continue in our belief that those elected have our best interest in mind? Why do we believe that all of a sudden those in congress that keep $90,000 in their freezer, that take bribes, fix congressional districts so as to virtually guarantee re-election will all of a sudden give a whit about your daughter’s tonsils?
Let individuals decide what is best for their family. Let individuals be responsible for their healthcare.
Why must the government be in the business of providing FREE HEALTHCARE? Yes free! Why should anyone work any longer? With no income everyone gets free food, housing and now healthcare! Yea, GO TEAM! (but wait, who is going to pay for all this?,,,hummmmm)
It is beyond me why anyone would ever think that the federal government can handle any effectively.
It’s not the best choice, but I think I would trust the government over a large corporation in this situation.
Also… AWESOME work Joe. Did you do that all yourself? My wife just got an email with that junk in it. All snopes says so far is “incomplete”. You should email them your efforts.
“It’s not the best choice, but I think I would trust the government over a large corporation in this situation.”
Yeah, this is in so many ways a “pick yer poison” choice. I would agree with you, if those were the only choices – government vs “a” large corporation – but that is not exactly what we are offered.
In the U.S. anyway, there are many large corporations, all competing with one another.
There is only one government.
By that small margin I favor the private sector which still has to compete for my attention vs. the government which can compel me to take whatever it wants to dish out.
I’m with Stella on this one. Just because government does not need to earn a profit does not mean its costs will be low, and just because its intentions to serve may be pure does not insure good (or even adequate) execution. I’ll take private companies competing for my business.
You could compare the cost of VA or Medicare to the cost of American private insurance and see the advantage readily. Also, as a non-profit, the government will not be trying to find ways to deny coverage for its bottom line.
Why trust the government? I’m not completely in favor or against, but by most measures Medicare FAR outperforms private insurance on efficiency and medical costs, especially considering they typically get the worst kinds of patients. Administrative costs in Medicare are a scant few percent while in private plans they run up to 20%.
“Administrative costs in Medicare are a scant few percent while in private plans they run up to 20%.”
Even more astonishing when you consider that private insurance companies administer Medicare under contract to CMS.
“Depending on the insured’s acuity” –
I think you mean the *acuteness* of the insured’s condition, not his acuity.
(It’s lucky for the Canadian emailer that his system does not discriminate in that regard! :) )
Aubrey says: “It is beyond me why anyone would ever think that the federal government can handle any effectively.”
Perhaps the answer is because the GOVERNMENTS IN EVERY OTHER DEVELOPED COUNTRY HANDLE HEALTHCARE AT ABOUT TWO-THIRDS THE COST OF OUR PRIVATE SYSTEM WITH THE SAME OR BETTER RESULTS!!! But that little nugget isn’t likely to penetrate your brain because you’re too busy intoning your mantra … government bad … government bad … government bad. Open yer frickin eyes.
If we don’t trust the government to do a good job running healthcare then I would suggest that as citizens we should insist on a better government.
You only need to look at the WHO report on international health systems to see that, in terms of government healthcare expenditure per capita, it *is* possible for a government to run an effective (and efficient) healthcare system.
To suggest that we should accept a substandard healthcare system because we have a substandard government who probably can’t do better is somewhat defeatist. Shouldn’t we be striving for better government *and* better healthcare?
Why should we be looking to the government to run healthcare? Because one of the fundamental roles of a government in a democracy with a market economy is to intercede where the market fails. You cannot deliver a social good (the improved health of the nation’s citizens) when your focus is on delivering a profit. The two things are mutually exclusive. We know this because healthcare companies don’t compete on the basis of providing better healthcare at a lower cost, they compete on the basis of improved risk profiling (exclusions and denial of coverage).
Hah, this is funny, I wrote up a debunking of this exact forward for a couple of American friends. It’s remarkable how much of it is either a) flat out wrong, or b) couched in weak attempts to conflate universal healthcare with other wedge issues, such as immigration and so forth. It’s kinda sad, actually.
And to those defending the US system, consider the following expenditure numbers. These are straight from nationmaster.com, who references all their sources:
First, health expenditures (all numbers per capita):
US
—-
Total : $4,631 (13.9% of GDP)
Public (government funding): $2,051
Private (out-of-pocket) : $2,580
Growth in expenditures per annum: 3.2%
Canada
———–
Total : $2,535 (9.4% of GDP)
Public : $1,826
Private : $709
Yeah, that’s right, in the US, you spend more than double, per capita, on health care. But what’s really remarkable is that more *public* money is spent, too! And yet, here are the uninsured figures, pulled straight from the US census:
Total uninsured: 43,574,000 (15.2%)
Total in families: 34,241,000 (14.5%)
By age (percentages are for age group):
Under 18: 8,531,000 (11.6%)
18-24 : 8,128,000 (29.6%)
25-34 : 9,769,000 (24.9%)
35-44 : 7,781,000 (17.7%)
45-64 : 9,106,000 (13.5%)
65+ : 258,000 (0.8%)
Household Income:
<$25,000 : 14,776,000 (23.5%)
$25,000 – $49,999 : 14,638,000 (19.3%)
$50,000 – $74,999 : 6,904,000 (11.8%)
$75,000+ : 7,256,000 (8.2%)
Work Experience:
Total 18-64: : 34,785,000
Worked during year : 25,679,000 (18%)
Worked full-time : 19,911,000 (16.8%)
Worked part-time : 5,767,000 (23.5%)
Did not work : 9,106,000 (25.7%)
In other words, you spend nearly double on healthcare, including more public money, and 15% of the US population isn’t even covered! And it’s not a problem for any particular age group or income level, and it affects the employed and unemployed alike.
Face it. US healthcare is broken. Period. Anyone who denies this is simply burying their head in the sand. Now, is Canadian-style healthcare the answer? I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not. Remember, there are a *ton* of other possible models out there. But one thing is for certain: the US model is, hands down, one of the worst.
Just clicking through on a link…
The woman who won’t get arterial surgery unless she stops smoking has a very good surgeon. Re-occlusion rates in smokers are high enough that surgery is not a recommended treatment.
To “Aubrey”. You seem to be afraid to allow the “government” to play the primary role in making sure that every American get quality health care, but I have few questions for you. Do you have a problem with the “government” prosecuting the “War on drugs”, which has been going on for 27 years now? Or the “War on Terror” which is liable to last into perpetuity as fighting an adverb as apt to require? What I believe “Aubrey’, is like most regressives, you only have a problem with government, or government involvement when it is not supporting your ideological leanings. Also, how are your personal “Freedoms”‘ impinged by public school. You can still send your child to a private one. you can buy private security to ride by Your house if you’d like. You can also dig a private well for your water. Be real. You hate government only when you think it doesn’t benefit you directly.
The health care system, meaning those who provide the service, is mostly private in Canada. The government only steps in to help fund it. Among other things, it mandates that young healthy people contribute while they have the money, and not put off contributing to when they are older and have serious health problems.
The provincial governments do organize large organizations like hospitals, including “private” hospitals (build and run by private organizations but funded as part of the public system). The federal government provides some of the money, especially for financially weak provinces (which provinces need this fluctuates) and of course mandates medical practises and standards.
Having lived in the USA, I found that having a drug plan encouraged my physician to do such things as prescribe brand-name Motrin even though it has no descernible benefit compared to generic alternatives which were available and in general prescribe expensive drugs with no particular purpose. American magazines directed at gay men are filled with ads for antiretroviral drugs, a very costly item which obviously many men in the USA are paying for out of their pockets. In this country there are no such ads since they are in the first place illegal and since the physicians select HIV drugs based on medical benefits and the patients never see a bill.
The Canadian system’s benefits are financial: patients get attention even when their finances are lacking, and must contribute to the system even when they are healthy, and finally is equitable for most (not all) people in the system (provincial premiums are still an issue here). The other things, quality of care have the same random factors as in the US, such as patient compliance with treatment, variation in physician competence, attempts by pharmaceutical companies to get physicians to try new, expensive, but unproven remedies.
“Ok, maybe it is fiction, maybe only a tiny part of it is fact.
Regardless…”
No. No “regardless”…It’s a fiction. Whatever you choose to believe is up to you, but if you want to base your beliefs on lies, you’ll get what you deserve.
It really is disgusting that our friends to the South have engaged in this propaganda war to challenge health care policy in the US. Why don’t they just mind their own business?
Here is an anecdotal response from a Canadian who has lived in “have” and “have-not” provinces. I have received nothing but excellent care in all three, even one of the poorest provinces. The biggest discrepency I have found has been with rural vs. urban settings in that rural care requires patient travel and many doctors are not willing to move to rural settings because of the workload. Most members of my family, even those with chronic illnesses, have received prompt and excellent care. My father only had to wait three days for a non-emergency MRI. My nephew who had cancer started receiving treatment the day it was diagnosed. I, as a student with no health insurance, have had access to dermatologists, gastroenterologists, diagnostic scans, etc. I know that if I get in an accident I won’t have to declare bankruptcy or have my parents re-mortgage their house.
The Canadian medical association is pro-private insurance-driven health care, and accordingly tend to find a lot wrong with the system. They don’t think that 400-500k (or more, depending on the appointment) is simply enough for a surgeon to live off. OB-GYNs make in the 300’s. The lowest paid are family physicians, who make well over 100k. These aren’t peanuts.
Also noteworthy is that doctors here tend NOT to overprescribe drugs and diagnostic tests, because they aren’t as afraid of getting sued (Canadians are very much less litgious than Americans) so that saves the system a lot of money (and saves the doctors a lot of money since their malpractice insurance isn’t as expensive). I have talked to people who work in both systems and they are of the opinion that there are a lot of unecessary surgeries and medications being prescribed down south.
So, you can drink the kool-aid or not, but ask the average Canadian which system they prefer, and they will likely say “Canada’s”, even if they are inconvenienced by a three hour emergency room wait for a sprained ankle (because they tend to take heart attack patients first).
Also ask if we mind our taxes going to help the less fortunate and most (but definitely not all) say “of course not”!
one more thing-another bonus to our system is that we don’t have to worry about switching jobs if we HATE the job we are in becuase we won’t be insured or have a condition insured. Therefore we are probably a bit happier.
1. We already have government-provided health insurance here in America. It’s called Medicare. Medicare is quite popular. Attempts to eliminate Medicare during the Reagan administration resulted in hoards of “Gray Panthers” rioting in the halls of Congress and beating Congressmen over the head with their canes and walkers. Why is Medicare good enough for wrinkled prunes, but not for the rest of us?
2. Medicare spends far less on administrative costs than private insurance does. 1/3rd of medical costs in non-government-provided care in America is administrative expense and profits for insurance companies, but with Medicare, only 3% goes to administrative overhead.
3. Employer-provided insurance — the U.S. system — has an inherent bias against preventative care, which is why the U.S. has the unhealthiest workforce of any industrialized nation. We as individuals have no choice in insurance. Our employers make that choice. Employers (the ones who actually pay for the insurance) have an inherent bias against spending any money on preventative care for you, because statistics show that you’ll be gone to another company within five years and that other company would get all the benefit of that preventative care. Why would your employer want to benefit another company? This is a case where what’s good for you and what’s good for the company are two different things, and you are the loser.
As a result, here in America less than 50% of all diabetic children get the care they need for a healthy lifespan, less than 45% of adults get the preventative care that is recommended by doctors, and the lifespan and incidence of preventable deaths is higher than in any other industrialized country. I’m not fond of any government-provided insurance schemes, but given that what we are doing simply IS NOT WORKING, and current U.S. health insurance companies are completely corrupted and in many cases utterly criminal (they usually deny coverage automatically for any expensive procedure, requiring you to go through years of appeals to get payment for necessary care in hopes you’ll die before they have to pay out), I don’t see any choice that is reasonable other than Medicare For All. Medicare. If it’s good ’nuff for the prunes, why isn’t it good ’nuff for the rest of us?
– Badtux the Healthcare Penguin
Don’t think Bob Laszewski would agree with point #2, Badtux. Here’s what he said in a recent blog….
But wait, what is the one thing health plans pay that Medicare doesn’t pay? Taxes!
Wellpoint and United each paid taxes equal to about 3% of their revenue in the first quarter of 2007 (that’s 3% of revenue not profit).
So, Medicare’s real expense ratio is a lot closer to 10% than 3%.
The big HMOs have expense, tax, and profit ratios of about 17%. But, take 3 points from that because it was income taxes paid to the government–meaning their net cost is around 14%. Apples to apples, Humana paid out 89.3% of its senior revenue on benefits leaving 10.7% of expenses, taxes, and profits. Give them credit for taxes and who’s out front now?
Awesome discussion, I linked to this more wilting attack on this forward on my website, good job on the debunk.
I did a response to this letter as well, but was a little more neutral in tone since I was sending it back to my very conservative family. If I become the liberal of the family that’s going to greatly affect the Cobbler I receive each summer!
check it out here: http://fosterspot.blogspot.com/2007/10/chain-letter-blasts-canadian-health.html
Actually, the only discussion of refusing treatment tp people because of “lifestyle” came up in the context of a liver transplant for an uncontrolled alcoholic. Which was basically a question of priority of patient, rather than absolute disqualification.
Barry writes, “I’ll take private companies competing for my business.”
Well, no — they’ll want your business while you’re healthy, but the minute you’re sick, they won’t be competing for your business at all. They’ll find the quickest way to deny you coverage and/or dump you. That’s the problem. It’s not truly a free market. Yes, you can find coverage if you’re very sick — but it will usually cost so much that it will bankrupt you. Health care is not something that’s optional; it’s a necessity. Which is why the law of supply and demand doesn’t work well in this instance.
Mara – You’re describing the individual underwritten insurance market which only insures about 18 million people. Approximately 170 million people get their coverage through an employer. I have had some very significant health issues over the past 10 years for which total costs (at contract rates, not list price) were $150K-$200K. I have never had a problem getting a claim paid. My employer self-insures and, in fact, made improvements to its plan at the start of this year. I’ve had the same insurer (and employer) for the last 14 years.
Private insurers compete for Medicare patients on a must take all comers basis. It’s called Medicare Advantage. They also compete for Medicare Part D patients. If they wind up with a riskier than average Medicare Advantage population, they receive risk adjustment payments from the government. If their pool is less risky than average, the government receives an appropriate refund.
Under universal coverage with community rating, mandatory participation, and a risk adjustment payment mechanism to level population risk among insurers, I would bet a lot of money that competition will work just fine. I certainly prefer that to a one size fits all government system that we would be stuck with no matter how expensive and inefficient it turns out to be. Think public education in the inner cities.
I am a Canadian, and I say good job on the debunkage! I just got this nonsense e-mail forwarded to me by a concerned friend in California who wanted to know if it was true. I was able to confidently tell her no, and I posted a link to this page among the URLs I sent her. I hope she sends it back to whoever sent her that original piece of garbage.
To those in the States who believe the hype about our system vs. yours–I hope you don’t get sick, because if you do, chances are you’ll still be forced to pay through the nose for your visit. I’m not–EVER–thanks to single-payer care. The phrases “co-pay” and “billing department” are so alien up here that if you’re not talking to a snowbird, chances are you’ll be met with a blank stare–they are simply not in our vocabulary.
And minor inconveniences like ER triage aside (how dare they favor a guy with vital signs absent over li’l ol’ sniffling me!), I’m not complaining. I do have a GP, whom I get to see whenever I really need to, and I had no problem scheduling an elective surgery with her referral. We even have a new hospital in my town, and it just got a new MRI machine. So, we don’t get to “choose” who picks our pockets when we have the nerve to get sick or hurt, or need an operation? Ha! We get all we need. It doesn’t have to be gold-plated in order to work, or entice us to come (as if people needed “incentives” to buy this or that brand of sick-care–what a hilarious idea).
And there IS no billing desk at the hospital; that saves the system a bundle of money right there. Not to mention us poor taxpayers, who would otherwise be paying through the nose for the “competitive advantage” of having to see who charges the highest administrative fees (for correspondingly lower levels of service, of course. Gotta make those profits SOMEWHERE.)
Our only real complaint is getting enough of our newly graduated doctors and nurses back from Greedhead Gringoland. Small towns need doctors; our cities are all but glutted with ’em. But a lot of them do come back eventually, once they’ve paid off their student loans…disillusioned by the inferior system they find down your way. A lot of them mention that they didn’t dare get sick, because they knew they wouldn’t get all the treatment they needed without a big forkful of buckeroos. We’ve even had at least one eminent doctor from the US come up here from Chicago specifically because he likes our system better; he was interviewed at Sick Kids a couple of years ago and praised our system in no uncertain terms. Imagine, a doctor who likes being able to practice pediatrics rather than wallet biopsies!
Only in Canada, eh? Pity.
I always have to laugh when I read people who say they don’t trust government with their healthcare and prefer private companies. what does this mean? You don’t trust the post office? Public schools and libraries? Our roads and public water systems? Medicare? Social Security? But you trust Enron? Haliburton? Worldcom? You prefer private insurance middlemen (they are not providers of healthcare) who then limit your choice of doctors? You prefer a system that puts, by law, profit first and keeps problems hidden and solves them in favor of stock holders over a system that answers to the public and patients first? Wow. The insurance industry has done a great job marketing.
Would everyone offering a comment include a disclaimer about:
1) whether they have health care coverage
2) whether they have a financial interest, stocks, etc. in whomever they are commenting/ranting/LARGE CAPPING about?
It would help when tracking the ideological slant.
Mine: BC provincial coverage