Canada: The Real Issues

Abstract

Canadians are, by and large, satisfied with their health care system. It is for them a symbol of their community and distinguishes them from the United States. Unlike the health system of that country, it is universal, comprehensive, and accessible, and it costs less as a percentage of GNP to run. The difference between the two systems is rooted in differences in funding. By providing coverage of medically necessary care under a single nonprofit payer (the provincial governments, with guidance and some funds from the federal government), the Canadian system avoids the large overheads and profit incentives that make a fragmented private insurance industry so expensive and inequitable. Whereas health insurance in Canada is socialized, care is not: patients are free to choose among providers, physicians are primarily in private practice, and hospitals are independent, nonprofit institutions overseen by boards of trustees. Canada and the United States view the challenges confronting the Canadian system differently. To Canadians, the real issue is how to improve the management of a popular, effective, and heretofore affordable system, so as to preserve it in a more hostile economic environment. The specific areas of concern are common to all health care systems in the developed world but bear little resemblance to the misleading images of Canada fabricated in the United States for internal political purposes. For Canadians, the proof of their system is that it works, while millions in the United States go without.

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