An Open Letter to Opponents of Barack Obama’s Health Care Reform Plan
I am deeply troubled by the discourse in your country about health care reform. Such irrational discussion, with accusations of death panels, socialism and unfair competition for private insurers does not reflect well on your country. Our health care debates are more civilized. Canadians have recognized the superiority of a government-run system and rightfully refuse to change it in any way.
We don’t scream about death panels and care rationing; instead, we shout about two-tier health care and brain drain. Polite, reasoned shouting.
As we all know, adding even the slightest private element to our public system would thoroughly destroy it.
You have claimed private insurers would be unable to compete with a government option, but in Canada, public Medicare simply cannot risk a private option!
All the good doctors would leave to work at private clinics, leaving only those who scraped through medical school by stealing exam answers and faking rare diseases to get out of exams. Smallpox and rickets would be out of control and our infant mortality rate might even begin to approach that of your fine country.
Hospital wait times have been responsible for some of the great classics of Canadian literature.
The award-winning Waiting for Dr. Godot was written in a Toronto hospital emergency room and is acted out daily by unsuspecting amateur actors across the country. Yes, my cat can get treated faster than me. But poor little Fluffy won’t live as long as I will!
The new wait-times reduction program, where doctors perform two surgeries at the same time, has been remarkably successful. So long as you don’t count the surgical outcomes.
The government system does not restrict my choices: it allows me to receive care at whichever run-down rat-trap of a hospital is nearest to my home and is theoretically equipped to treat me. I may have had to drive six hours to deliver my baby in a hallway, but at least my HMO can’t refuse to pay because having a uterus is a pre-existing condition. I simply cannot understand why Americans are fighting so irrationally against a public option, given the benefits I have just described. In a public system everyone receives the same mediocre treatment, unless they happen to be an NHL player or a politician. To paraphrase Orwell, under public medicine, everyone is equal. But some are more equal than others.
Sincerely,
Linda Smith
Concerned Canadian Citizen
