Here are several critical letters, arguing against the CMA vision of Medicare. The non-sensical rhetoric of Medicare Plus is ridiculous. The plus is a two tier system and more money for doctors. The CMA vision is short-sighted.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
TheStar.com - comment - Two tiers of patients?
Two tiers of patients?
Aug 04, 2007 04:30 AM
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New fight looms over medicare
Editorial, Aug. 1
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Doctors are, one would hope, scientific thinkers. They diagnose illness every day based on a process of looking at evident symptoms, eliminating unlikely causes, determining the illness and then deciding on a treatment.
It's puzzling, then, that when assessing the health of our medicare system, they've made a recommendation for treatment – allowing increased corporate presence in Canadian health care – without any mention of evidence. They've opted instead to employ rhetoric that does little to actually address the damage that would be done by continuing to chip away at universal health care.
What the CMA is proposing should not be called "Medicare Plus" but "Medicare Minus," because it is medicare, minus a sustainable supply of doctors. Every doctor who works in a private clinic is a doctor who is not working in the public system. It takes six years and more than $950,000 to train a family doctor in Canada; it takes nine years and more than $2.3 million to train a specialist.
How can the CMA argue in good conscience that private health care is a "safety valve"? We know that privatization will drain the public system and make waits longer for all but the rich.
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Paul Moist, National President,
Canadian Union of Public Employees, Ottawa
Here we go again. The Canadian Medical Association's euphemism "Medicare Plus" is nothing more than an attack on Canadian values for doctors' personal financial gain. Regardless of race, status, gender and education, Canadians have had guaranteed access to a viable public health-care system for decades. The CMA seeks to change the system by adding a "better" and "faster" service that allows the rich (my word) to jump the queue simply because they have more money.
Doctors are endorsing the change to a "Medicare Plus" system because they can add to their wealth with the help of the rich. Together both groups would gain – the doctors financially, the rich with better access – but they need each other to succeed. The CMA has become the voice of the rich and, sadly, not the voice for all Canadians.
Money and status should not be determining factors in deciding which Canadians have access to health-care services.
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Colin MacKay, Castleton, Ont.
The Canadian Medical Association should be on notice that whilst pushing for doctors to work in both the public and private health-care systems, Ontario taxpayers would be extremely disappointed with their elected government should such private activities be covered under the government-subsidized malpractice liability insurance, which was previously reported as being in the amount of 90 per cent of the insurance cost.
It would be in the interests of those paying into OHIP that any private health-care operations pay for this very expensive insurance protection themselves. In Europe and the U.S., this cost can amount to 50 per cent of annual income.
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John Curtis, Bobcaygeon, Ont.
I find it hard to believe that the majority of doctors in Canada agree with their elected leaders in the Canadian Medical Association and want a two-tier system of medicare. The attitudes of both outgoing and incoming CMA presidents seem more interested in how much money doctors can make, rather than the health of most Canadians.
I hope doctors and citizens will listen to Roy Romanow and research done by Maude Barlow and the Council of Canadians, showing how the two-tier system has always led to a double standard – one for the rich and one for everyone else.
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Larry Carney, Clifford, Ont.
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