On 25 July 2017 I wrote an op-ed in the Financial Post arguing that the latest international health care rankings from the Commonwealth Fund put paid to any notion that Canada has the best health care system in the world. Not even close. As I noted:
“While the U.K. doesn’t allow user fees for most health-care services, there are charges for some, while people using the private system must pay the full shot. User fees or co-payments are standard in both Australia and the Netherlands, not to mention the other countries with proud traditions of quality public health care who also outperform us in these rankings. In many cases, doctors and other health-care professionals practise outside the public system without that system being unable to recruit the professionals they need. Yet access, equity and outcomes in these systems is superior to what we enjoy here in Canada, disproving the oft-heard argument that any compromise on these “principles” would signal the end of our commitment to a fair, high-quality system in which no one suffered economic hardship through illness or disease.
“In fact the reverse is true. Even the best civil service in the world cannot save a system whose design is flawed at its heart and which no other country committed to similar principles holds up as a model (despite Canada being seen internationally as having the “most positive influence globally” according to yet a third international ranking). In fact, it is the defenders of the status quo who are denying Canadians the kind of experimentation and reform that provide superior equity and outcomes in our peer countries every day.”
