MDs back parallel private health care
JULIA NECHEFF
CANADIAN PRESS
EDMONTON—The Canadian Medical Association threw its support behind a parallel, private health-care system yesterday.
In what was a historic vote for the influential organization, delegates decided by a two-to-one margin that patients should be able to go outside the public health-care plan and use private insurance if they can't get necessary medical care quickly enough.
It's a major change for the association, which until now has been unequivocal in its support for a strong public system. The last time the CMA voted on such a motion was in 1996 when it reaffirmed its support.
But times have changed, said those who supported the motion during the public-private debate, which was supposed to end Tuesday but was carried over to yesterday — something that has never been done before at a CMA convention.
Supporters of the motion said too-long waiting lists are an urgent problem, the system is faltering and it needs help from the private sector.
"Governments have had 40 years to get the monopoly system right and the casualties are piling up — one of them has been my wife," said Dr. John Slater of Comox, B.C.
"I have stopped believing ... the government will ever fix the monopoly system."
President-elect Dr. Ruth Collins-Nakai disputed that the medical association is endorsing private health care.
The primary concern of physicians of Canada is that patients have timely access to quality care based on need, not ability to pay, said Collins-Nakai, a pediatric cardiologist in Edmonton.
Every resolution passed reflected the frustration of physicians not being able to provide timely access to care that they so want for their patients, she said.
"Delegates have said clearly that they believe the best solution is to provide that type of access is through a public health-care system," she added.
CANADIAN PRESS
Source
CANADIAN PRESS
EDMONTON—The Canadian Medical Association threw its support behind a parallel, private health-care system yesterday.
In what was a historic vote for the influential organization, delegates decided by a two-to-one margin that patients should be able to go outside the public health-care plan and use private insurance if they can't get necessary medical care quickly enough.
It's a major change for the association, which until now has been unequivocal in its support for a strong public system. The last time the CMA voted on such a motion was in 1996 when it reaffirmed its support.
But times have changed, said those who supported the motion during the public-private debate, which was supposed to end Tuesday but was carried over to yesterday — something that has never been done before at a CMA convention.
Supporters of the motion said too-long waiting lists are an urgent problem, the system is faltering and it needs help from the private sector.
"Governments have had 40 years to get the monopoly system right and the casualties are piling up — one of them has been my wife," said Dr. John Slater of Comox, B.C.
"I have stopped believing ... the government will ever fix the monopoly system."
President-elect Dr. Ruth Collins-Nakai disputed that the medical association is endorsing private health care.
The primary concern of physicians of Canada is that patients have timely access to quality care based on need, not ability to pay, said Collins-Nakai, a pediatric cardiologist in Edmonton.
Every resolution passed reflected the frustration of physicians not being able to provide timely access to care that they so want for their patients, she said.
"Delegates have said clearly that they believe the best solution is to provide that type of access is through a public health-care system," she added.
CANADIAN PRESS
Source
posted by The Naked Gord Program at 12:34 AM
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