If we view the health care delivery system as a social system, it becomes amenable to sociological analysis. In analyzing social systems, it is very important to understand the world view or belief system that guides their behaviour and tends to determine roles, norms, status hierarchy, rewards and values.
Health, health care system, pharmacare
Alberta Premier Ralph Klein likes to call his contribution to politics the “Alberta Advantage”.
Unfortunately, if he gets his way with Alberta’s health care system, only the financially advantaged will partake in his version of the Alberta Advantage. The rest will be truly disadvantaged.
The Alberta government's latest proposal to allow people to buy private insurance for medically necessary services and let doctors “double-dip” between public and private payment flies in the face of the best evidence available around the world while breaching cherished Canadian values.
Proponents of turning more of Canada’s public Medicare system over to private care providers could only justify such privatization if they could convince Canadians that doing so would improve the quality, accessibility, and affordability of health care in Canada. The onus should be on those who want to privatize delivery and payment to show how investor-owned services and private payment would improve or even maintain the demonstrable advantages the public system has to offer.
The slow, very public murder of Medicare as a universal, publicly-funded, single-tier health system has been going on for 20 years. The public failed to awaken fully to the murder because the assassins, even as they slowly throttled Medicare, smiled and claimed they were trying to resuscitate it.
Waits for care are the biggest political issue facing Canadian health care—a priority reflected in the accord reached by the federal and provincial health ministers a few days ago. They agreed to set limits on wait times for major surgeries and treatments, but conceded that these limits would be targets rather than guarantees. This is welcome news for Canadians already on long wait lists. But, despite years of debate on the issue there is still little discussion of making more efficient use of existing resources and facilities.
OTTAWA—A study released today by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives shows that there are public sector solutions to Canada’s wait list problems. While often touted, private for-profit clinics actually tend to make things worse.
Author Dr. Michael Rachlis asserts that, instead of going down this road, Canadians should choose public sector solutions. The paper highlights two innovative approaches:
1. establish more specialized public short-stay surgical centres; and2. adopt modern methods of queue management from other sectors.
Dear Sirs and Madams:
Last week John Doyle of the Globe and Mail told us that the CBC had decided not to air a documentary on Tommy Douglas – which would inevitably discuss the birth of Medicare - because it might be perceived as indulging in partisanship during a federal election.
Last night the CBC aired a show on the Passionate Eye, “Medicare Schmedicare”, which dismissed Medicare and celebrated the glories of being able to pay directly for health care.
These days, public health care seems like a high-stakes TV poker game complete with bluffers willing to gamble its future away.
For the third election in a row, health care is the top of mind issue. And, for the third election in a row, every federal party leader pledges to protect health care. But beware the bluffer.
Canadians have indicated consistently we want two things in health care: A publicly insured system that provides care and promotes health, there for people based on their need, not their ability to pay. And we don't want to waste a single penny.
This new study shows how South Africa’s flagship health legislation conflicts with binding commitments the former apartheid regime negotiated under the World Trade Organization’s General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). This trade treaty conflict threatens to undermine the much-needed legislation and, if left unresolved, would make meeting the health needs of the majority of the population far more difficult. The study explores several options that South Africa has for resolving this conflict in favour of its health policy imperatives, but each entails risk. South Africa’s dilemma