http://www.newsmax.com/showinsidecover.shtml?a=1999/11/24/01247

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Wednesday November 24, 1:18 AM

Vaunted Canadian Gov't Health Care System in Collapse

With the usual suspects ginning up resentment against America's private-sector HMOs, you'd think it was this nation's health care system that was rapidly spinning out of control.

Not exactly, explains David Gratzer in his new book Code Blue, which instead ascribes that nightmare scenario to the supposed health care utopia to the north, Canada.

New York Post columnist David Frum explored Gratzer's book on Tuesday in a column titled "Killed by National Health Care."

Killed? That's right, as in the case of 61-year-old heart patient Philip Georgiou, who checked in to a British Columbia hospital complaining of chest pains in 1997. An angiogram showed Georgiou needed immediate surgery. Twelve days later, while still awaiting the procedure, Georgiou lapsed into cardiac arrest and died.

Then there was 66-year-old Jeannine Lacombe, who sought treatment for her chest pains at Montreal's Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital. She was strapped to a gurney and wheeled into a hallway, where -- lost among 63 other patients similarly situated -- four hours later she was discovered dead.

Frum passed on other stunning tidbits from Gratzer's book, such as the fact that the average American cancer patient waits no more than 10 days for radiation therapy while Canadians typically cool their heels for four times that long. An MRI scan in the U.S. can be had after an average wait of four days. In Canada, try 150.

The delays have exacted their toll. The number of years a Canadian can expect to live in good health has actually fallen since 1978. It's now 2.3 years less for women, 0.4 years less for men.

For all the corner cutting, Canadians don't have much by way of savings to show for their trouble. In fact, under nationalized health care, prices have skyrocketed 33 percent since 1990. Canadian Medicare already consumes 21 cents out of every payroll dollar.

In America, liberals have already begun demagoguing the health care issue in preparation for next year's presidential campaign. That includes the mother of Hillarycare herself, who kicked off her U.S. Senate bid last summer by telling New Yorkers that she'd learned her lesson after her own 1994 health care debacle.

Next time, Hillary said, she'll go more slowly.

-- Homer Beanfang (Bats@inbellfry.com), November 24, 1999

Answers

And how many American's died because THEY COULDN'T GET HEALTH CARE AT ALL?

How much of your dollar now goes to Medicare and Medicaid and your state run health programs and STILL PEOPLE ARE DYING IN AMERICA BECAUSE THEY CAN'T GET HEALTH CARE?

Sorry to shout. Ours may be broken .... but your's has been on the side of the road going nowhere for years.

-- Your (kanook@frozentundra.com), November 24, 1999.

Y2k Prozac,

I see you haven't patched that hole in your space suit.

-- Homer Beanfang (Bats@inbellfry.com), November 24, 1999.

Yep, Homer, throw Y2K wrenches in national "healthcare" systems already grinding to a deathful stop and you'll get Millions More premature deaths, preventable deaths, untold suffering.

Homer of the Reality Posts, THANK YOU !!!!

Y2K + healthcare ~ ~

As worker bees who have slaved in hospitals, clinics, nursing homes, adult foster care homes, retirement facilities, assisted living complexes, convent nursing wings, hospices, and boatloads of home care, we can say this:

Any disruptive jolt lasting more than 2 weeks to the carrying capacity of the acute/chronic medical conveyor belt will result in MANY DEATHS. Period.

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), November 24, 1999.

Homer (Harpo?):

You spoke! I was sure that you were some fully automated search engine/posting sub-routine.

-- Dave (aaa@aaa.com), November 24, 1999.

Homer et al,

Two stories of unfortunate deaths do not an epidemic make. I have the pleasure of being personally acquainted w/ Mr. Frum, and know something of his agenda. The welfare state is not on it.

I'm hugely grateful for socialized medicine in Canada, and I'm generally a very healthy person.

-- silver ion (notsobadhereinC@nada.eh), November 24, 1999.

Homer was that you ;-)

-- karla (karlacalif@aol.com), November 24, 1999.

If the Canadian system works at all, it works to the extent that wealthy Canadians can afford to come across the border and pay to use our system, thus taking some of the load off the socialized scam.

-- walt (walt@lcs.k12.ne.us), November 24, 1999.

We like it. We liked it better before, but a huge majority of Canadians support our health care system. One of my (enormous) pet peeves is that in my province, we have a premier (state governor equivalent) who would like to import US private hospitals. NONONONONONONO!!!!!!

If he wants to live in the States, he's welcome to go there. I like living in a country with few guns and health care even for those who can't afford it. I like visiting the States and have no desire to live there - just as most US citizens I've met like to visit Canada and have no desire to live here. What I do NOT want is to have Canada become 'just like the States'.

(rant off)

-- Tricia the Canuck (tricia_canuck@hotmail.com), November 24, 1999.

All the more reason to get yourselves healthy and avoid doctors and hospitals if at all possible. There's noplace on earth that I would rather be if I was in an accident or had sudden, lifethreatening illness than the US. They have the best trauma physicians in the world. But please spare me the routine medical "care" of pharmaceutical-and-sugar-and-cereal-subsidized doctors in most offices around the country today. There are just enough good doctors here and there to prove my point. (quickly donning asbestos jammies...)

-- Liz Pavek (lizpavek@hotmail.com), November 25, 1999.