Unable to sleep last night with nothing better to see on TV, I watched this little gem of a hearing by the House Republican Health Care Solutions Group - An oxymoron if I ever have seen one...
The panel was invited from Canada and UK to tell the negative parts of Single Payer system. Now we all know that is not being proposed, but the linkage the Republicans are arguing is that this is the first step to Single Payer healthcare...
If we argue for shared sacrifice and rationing for all even for those who currently have good insurance...we lose and lose big...
http://www.c-spanarchives.org/...
The thrust of primarily the two Canadian panelists Shona a patient from Canada and the man to her right a Canadian businessman who arranges for a fee Canadians to come to the US to get expidited medical procedures and he negotiates deep discounts with US providers for them, is that Canada rations care to the point where anything that is not immediately life threatening has a terribly long waiting list due to lack of resources.
Even more frieghtening is the Canadian definition of elective procedures is so broad that you could wait months even if your condition made you temporarily or permanently disabled as long as death was not imminent.
Now I am sure these stories are exaggerated and I do not believe them for a minute that they are completely true....that being said:
- We had a well meaning Canadian diarist who wrote about his great experience with Canadian healthcare but in the end, he had to wait 7 months for his surgery and during that time, he was essentially temporarily disabled. The good news is that he did virtually paid nothing for his healthcare.
- We have had Kossacks say that it is OK to have to wait. For the majority of Americans who have insurance, waiting for surgical and diagnostic procedures for more than a couple of weeks is extremely rare.
- We currently have an abundance of complex imaging centers in this country and based on testimony, it appears there is a big shortage of diagnostic imaging and technicians in Canada.
- Canada funds their healthcare in such a way that they use the US as an emergency backup for capacity when needed. The US will have no such emergency backup, we need capacity that is self-sufficient for our needs.
- Part of the testimony focused on cancer and chemotherapy. That based on cost the provinces in Canada decided which chemotherapys were covered/allowed and there was wide variation from 23 of 25 chemotherapys in one province to 3 of 25 in another province. On a personal note for my wife who is currently undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer I want the availability for the doctor at MSK to choose any or a combination of the 25 chemotherapys based on their evidence and opinion of effectiveness regardless of cost.
- Part of the testimony focused on a young person who had discs in their spine pressing against their spinal cord and nerve root. Since the patient was unusually young and the she was not in imminent death, the surgery required was considered elective and she waited 7 years for surgery. In the meantime she became dependent on opiates and was permanently disabled. Again on a personal basis as one who suffered from a similar medical issue at age 37, I do not want to wait years just because my condition is not life threatening.
While many Kossacks believe that for the greater good, rationing for all is OK, that mindset will kill healthcare reform because the majority who have coverage (and yes it is still a majority) will not put up with inordinate wait times in order to provide healthcare for 97% - 98% of the population. We will have to sell healthcare reform as not like Canada that we can have our cake and eat it too.
As much as it pains people to say, the WIFM needs to be considered...and the WIFM for many people is still having access to get an MRI within a week or two and surgery pretty much upon the doctor's say so.