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home / 世界杯决赛2022

opinion: canadian health care — high costs, long waits

provincial health ministers blamed the federal government for underfunding health care and asked for a meeting with prime minister justin trudeau.

by lorrie goldstein

nov 10 2022
read time 3 minute read
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canadians pay more for health care through their taxes than 29 comparable countries with universal health care, while enduring the longest wait times for treatment among the 10 that track this data, according to a new study by the fraser institute.
the report, reflecting findings of similar studies in the past, comes in the wake of a two-day meeting of federal and provincial health ministers in vancouver that ended in disarray on tuesday.
provincial health ministers blamed the federal government for underfunding health care and asked for a meeting with prime minister justin trudeau.
trudeau responded while the federal government is prepared to increase federal funding for delivering health care, which is a provincial responsibility, provinces giving tax breaks to the rich, instead of properly funding health care, are part of the problem.
this federal-provincial blame game has gone on for decades, no matter the political stripes of the governments involved.
premiers accuse ottawa of underfunding health care and the federal government responds provinces need to demonstrate through credible data that federal funding is being used to improve health care.
as a result, meaningful reforms never happen and the result undermines canadian health care.

among the findings in the fraser institute report — comparing performance of universal health care countries, 2022 — based on 2020 data which is the latest available:

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canadians pay the highest costs for health care when adjusted for the age of our population among 29 other comparable countries, at 13.3% of gdp annually, and the eighth highest cost on a per capita basis of us $5,987.60 annually.
despite high costs canada ranks 28th out of 30 countries in the number of doctors (2.8 per 1,000 people); 23rd out of 28 in acute care beds (2.2 per 1,000); 22nd out of 29 in psychiatric beds (0.38 per 1,000); 26th out of 29 in the number of mri machines (10.3 per million people), and 27th out of 30 for ct scanners, (15 per million).
among 10 comparable universal health-care countries that track wait times, canada ranks last, with the lowest percentage of patients waiting four weeks or less to see a specialist, (38%), and the lowest percentage of patients waiting four months or less for elective surgery (62%).
a survey of 1,100 canadian doctors last year found the median wait time for medically-necessary elective medical treatment in canada in 2021 was 25.6 weeks from the time of a referral by a general practitioner to the start of treatment by a specialist.
that was up from 22.6 weeks from the first year of the pandemic in 2020 and 175% higher than the 9.3-week median wait time in 1993, the first year of data tracking.
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“despite canada’s high level of spending, availability and access to medical resources is generally worse than in comparable countries,” said study co-author bacchus barua. “its performance in terms of utilization and quality is mixed.”
the study said while all these deficiencies were made worse by the pandemic, they all existed before the start of the pandemic in early 2020.
the 29 other nations canada is being compared to include all members of the g7 — canada, u.k., germany, france, italy and japan — except for the u.s., excluded because it does not have universal health care.
“to improve canada’s health care system … policymakers should learn from other successful universal health-care countries, for the benefit of canadians and their families,” said study co-author mackenzie moir.
lorrie goldstein
lorrie goldstein

lorrie goldstein is the editor emeritus of the toronto sun and a member of the canadian news hall of fame. born and raised in toronto, he currently writes political columns and editorials for the toronto sun and sun media. joining the sun in 1978, he previously served as comment editor, senior associate editor, city editor, queen's park columnist and bureau chief, toronto city hall reporter, general assignment reporter and feature writer. active on social media, lorrie says being a political columnist for a major daily newspaper is one of the most rewarding and fun jobs anyone can have in journalism, and that anyone who complains about having to do it probably isn't doing it right.

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