McCain attacks Canadian and European health care

As a Canadian I would say our systems are different and not really comparable.  We cover everyone.  No payment arrangements are made by a Canadian when they visit a doctor or a hospital.  We give our Care Card number and that is it - we never see a bill or are in any way part of the billing procedure. 

The price we pay for covering all our cisizens is quality.  Both in terms of availability of specialists and in terms of access to capital intensive proceedures (MRI scans for instance).  We do have complete control over choosing our doctors and hospitals as payment is never an issue.

Having said that we do not provide the finest "gold standard" care.  Care that say would come to the top 5% of US insurance holders.  We do however provide better quality and access than what is available to most Americans.

We may just sleep a little better knowing that there is never going to be a time when we have to worry about the cost of any treatment for any medical condition we may face.  No Canadian ever went bankrupt trying to pay for a necesssary treatment.

We also pay much less for most drugs due to the bargaining power of a single payer system.  But in some cases that also means that we have to wait for a new drug to be covered in Canada if the national insurer decides that it is either too experimental or too expensive.

Our system, however, due to the monopoly model has some built-in inefficiencies.  We forbid private clinics from competing with public hospitals when it comes to "medically necessary treatments".  We have lots of private clinics but they are restricted to non-emergency treatments like joint replacements, cosmetic proceedures, physical rehabilitation, knee surgery and similar treatments that involve non-life threatening conditions.

I would not trade our system for that of the US.  Our working poor do not have to choose between health care and food or shelter nor do they have to put off treatment because they cannot afford it.  I think it makes for a healthier population overall.  I do think, however, that we should encourage more competition between the public sector providers and private clinics within a single payer model to increase our efficiencies.  The best model in my opinion would be a competitive single payer system that provides universal access to all citizens along with the efficiencies of a competitive market.