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As a Canadian, I'll be the first to say that our system isn't perfect. If you've got a chronic but not life-threatening condition, like a need for knee or hip surgery, you could spend a long time on a waiting list. There are certainly lots of affluent Canadians who opt to step out of that line to get treatment at private for-profit clinics, both domestically and abroad. There's always a shortage of something. Qualified doctors, nurses, family practitioners, CT or MRI machines, etc.
That being said, if you do have a life-threatening condition, the Canadian healthcare system can work pretty well. My step father had pneumonia Nov./Dec. last year, chest xray revealed something concerning beyond the pneumonia, by early January biopsies has been done, by February he'd started radiation, six or so weeks of that, then monitoring for a while and now he's in remission. Everything moved fast, because he had a time-critical condition. Total cost to my family: zero dollars (setting aside costs for gas, parking, snacks for stress-eating, etc.). I couldn't imagine a family going through the same situation in the US.
This is going to sound crazy, but that's also the case in the US. Months to see a specialist. Referred to another specialist. Wait months for an opening. It took me over a year of sporadic appointments just to get an epidural for back pain. It was ridiculous. All using "efficient" for-profit organizations where you pay out the ass for premiums and then they extract the rest through your dickhole if you dare to seek care.
There's also the self-imposed delays. How many days of waiting are racked up by Americans saying "let's see what happens" because of the prohibitive cost of accessing care?
I wonder what it looks like if you start the clock not at "You need hip replacement" but rather "My hip is acting up".
My aunt in Canada has had 2 hip replacements. And while she did have to wait, which is worse: waiting and not being in crushing medical debt? Or waiting a bit and having almost no costs?
Same for my father in law. If he were a US citizen he'd probably be bankrupt right now, or more likely just still be in pain because he couldn't afford the surgery in the first place.
If you compared wait times in Canada versus wait times in the U.S., Canada would probably be shorter overall.
The U.S. system creates artificial shortages in many different areas. They seek optimal profitablity by staffing slightly below what the need requires. This shortage justifies charging higher prices.
You can also probably blame some of the long wait times in Canada for things on the U.S. Specialist in the U.S. make a lot more money.
Here is Texas it is not uncommon when you have a health issue and call your primary doctor, to be told that they don't have any open appts for weeks and be told to go see an urgent care clinic instead. For profit primary doctors tend to arrange things so that all their time is filled up with non urgent "routine followups" or "annual checkups" and stuff that they have no time for any urgent medicare problems.
It depends who you're comparing. For the average US or Canadian citizen, I'm sure you're correct. If you look at income levels I bet it's a different story. The poor and middle class (whatever's left of it) have to wait, the rich have the option of paying out of pocket. If I wanted to have a whole-body MRI scan done, I could get one next week for $3200. Wouldn't even need to be sick! Requires a referral, but you can "obtain one virtually from (their) physician partners" and you know their "physician partners," aren't going to turn away business.
As a selfish American I’ll still gladly wait for treatment I want/need that isn’t life threatening if it means way fewer people die or drown in medical debt.
You get told it's just pneumonia, but it keeps coming back for years.
Eventually someone figures it out and says you have mesothelioma. You travel the country for a few years, looking for treatment wherever you can. It costs everything you have.
Somewhere along the way, you have to put down $120,000 in cash for a surgery that gives you a few more years. But your last years are still mostly pain and exhaustion.
I wish my uncle hadn't died the way he did.
there isn't a Canadian system, there are a bunch of provincial systems.