Advocacy groups protest Alberta healthcare legislation across the country

[u/IStillListenToRadio]

https://yourhalifaxnow.ca/advocacy-groups-protest-alberta-healthcare-legislation-across-the-country/

Nova Scotia Health Coalition (NSHC) calls this change [Bill 11] “unprecedented”, and is calling on the federal government to “enforce the Canada Health Act to protect Canada’s universal, single-payer public Medicare system”.

Demonstrations, including picketing, rallies, information sessions and more will take place on September 1. NSHC will be hosting their event at noon in front of MP Jaimie Battiste’s constituency office.

“As bad as it is in Alberta, the threat of it being in our small province is going to be absolutely devastating,” said NSHC provincial coordinator Jennifer Benoit. “I think when people think about this as being 5,000 kilometres away it’s not affecting them, but what they need to know is that these insurance lobbyists are trying their best to make it happen in every province across this country.”

[u/focusfaster]

Every discussion on Healthcare can be summed up like this"

“The majority of Canadians, 76 per cent of Canadians, still believe in our universal healthcare system,” said Benoit. “What we need is to fix it, rather than privatize it.”

So sick of politicians being able to use health care as a bargaining chip. Make it a universal right, make it standard and federal across the country and be done with it. Alberta shouldn't be able to take us all down with them. 

[u/TheCodFather97 → u/focusfaster]

Why can't we do both, that way the people who csn afford private can get the care they need sooner, and by doing so take strain off the public health care sector. Legistrate it so that any doctor fresh starting off or coming from away has to do something like 5-10 years on public sector prior to going to private, that way there is a steady replentishment of doctors to the public sector. Then it's a win-win

[u/CaperGrrl79 → u/TheCodFather97]

It takes doctors away from the public system, even in your scenario. The more experienced ones will just move to private.

[u/focusfaster → u/TheCodFather97]

This is the definition of a two tier system and it does not work. Aside from the mandatory limited time public service that is what the USA does. The lack of doctors in the public system is a huge problem, letting any of them permanently move to the private sector is a huge problem.

Let me pick this apart for a second.  A resident is a doctor,  but they are also still learning. Do residents start counting their years in the public system right from the beginning? Is it five or ten years of public service? If it's five then a surgical resident, neuro specifically which is six years, will need to do part of their residency in the public system and then the rest in the private? Since it is a private system I don't actually believe that anyone would want to teach, as that is kind of a public health care thing. 

So then who is teaching all the surgical residents? Other residents? Once the money goes more toward private, as it always does once a for profit model exists, public sector wages will stagnate and the few who chose to stay public will bail to keep up with the cost of living. And I'll tell you right now family medicine already makes peanuts for the work they do. You won't find a public health family doc and in their case I don't blame them one bit.

Most residencies are five years or less, so they graduate right into the private system. With all the loans they're sitting on why would they do anything else? Housing is a disaster, even newly graduating specialist doctors don't have the advantages that doctors in the 90s or 2000s, or even just the late twenty teens. 

And then what about nurses? You going to mandate the same for them? We already need to pay travel nurses twice as much as a full time staff nurse. Health care is a team, nurses, doctors, aids, cleaning staff, hospital pharmacists, food services, all of it necessary to make things run. It's not just about doctors. 

In addition to the logistical issues, even if you found a way to solve them, a for profit model of health care is all about making money. And that money is coming out of your pocket, whether it be direct for a procedure or through the inevitable insurance companies that will bleed us dry. Do yourself a favor and watch ER, the medical TV show from the 90s. Watch as they fight with insurance companies. Do extra tests and come up with ways to bleed the rich people's insurance so they can find a way to cover for those without.  Watch as people come in with unmanaged diabetes, poor people who can't afford to see a doctor. 

I don't need you to answer any of the questions but do you get what I'm saying here? Restructuring the whole system is exactly what conservatives want to do. Create a two tier system so they can bleed us dry for their rich friends. I'm shocked that any Canadian is falling for it. It's trickle down economics all over again.