Canadians are generally very satisfied with the quality and availability of healthcare in Canada. The issue in this case is not the quality of care but the possibility that the provincial government is suppressing testing that might reveal that a naturally-produced neurotoxin has contaminated bottom-feeding crustaceans such as lobster.
Canadian healthcare is great if you have a life threatening acute problem or you have no ability to or willingness to pay for healthcare. If you have anything in the middle its a giant slog against a large bureaucracy to actually get it treated. And you have ti have some conviction in what it is otherwise diagnose and adios as they say.
> Canadians are generally very satisfied with the quality and availability of healthcare.
I'd love to see the list of people you surveyed to draw this conclusion. In my metropolitan area availability is abysmal and (in my experience recently) quality is not great. I am contrasting this to my recent experiences in the US system.
That makes some sense - US healthcare is great if you are wealthy and barely existent if you are not. Canada strikes me as middle of the road - moderate quality for nearly everyone.
If you are one of the lucky 10% at the top of the heap US healthcare will outperform.
Nonsense. Middle class employment comes with health insurance that makes healthcare generally affordable, barring stories about catastrophic bankrupting illnesses that are actually rare.
Edit: what, am I out of touch? Is health insurance only provided to employees in the top 10%?
>>healthcare generally affordable, barring stories about catastrophic bankrupting illnesses
I think you're being down voted for the 'generally affordable' and 'bankrupting illnesses' parts. "Middle class" doesn't usually equate to tech level salaries or benefits. Family health insurance can be very expensive for middle class families. The extremely high family out-of-pocket max plans can turn even non-catastrophic illnesses into a financial crisis.
I notice you said recently. Keep in mind that we’re in a pandemic and elective procedures/many types of testing have been postponed. That’s because it’s a pandemic. I’m not so selfish to expect healthcare workers to work 24/7.
> Canadians are generally very satisfied with the quality and availability of healthcare in Canada.
If any of us are it's because of the pervasive anti-American propaganda spewn about.
My GF is from the Czech Republic (where we currently are) and since we got here she's been getting all her standard check ups done. Here she can make an appointment only a day in advance (as opposed to weeks or months out in Canada), there's no wait time (in Canada you usually wait even with an appointment) and dental/drugs are included in Czech Republic (in Canada only the most basic care is included, everything else is extra and quite expensive).
Czech Republic is seen as a second-rate EU country (at least what I've heard of it) but health care here is so far ahead of Canada we might as well be a third world country.
Edit - I should add, even before observing European health care, I knew a shocking amount of people who've gone to the US and even Mexico specifically for medical treatment. Canada's health care is abysmal, our politicians just convince everyone that everything is OK because it's "free" (never mind that we pay European-level taxes for far worse care).
Also, I come from the richest (per capita) Canadian province with the best health-care funding, which in my experience is the best in Canada, but still lacking...
Czech here. In theory, our healthcare system should work the way you described. In practice, a shortage of doctors is developing in less lucrative regions. You will always have good service in Prague or Brno, but elsewhere, you may run into problems.
This article shows a hundred-strong queue of patients waiting to register to a newly opened dentist office. Some of them waited overnight.
Fair enough. We're in Karlovy Vary region and everything has seemed very efficient.
One thing I have noticed is that Czechs are very critical of their country, which to my eyes seems to function quite well, for what it's worth.
Canadians put up with far worse and yet will defend it. Also, our whole country has a doctor shortage. No sane doctor stays in Canada when the US pays multiples more...
There is definitely a tendency towards some self-flagellation in CZ, though I think this is vastly more widespread elsewhere (just witness the ritual meltdowns in English language media whenever some election does not turn out perfectly "right").
I like to think I am pretty resistant to that. So, some earned praise: Czechia is a very safe country which was able to get some things work better than many others (we even have a functioning gun culture without too much machismo or regular bloodsheds - the compulsory safety and legal tests are a good filter against crazies). Our healthcare is fairly decent, though necessarily limited by the overall economic level, which is, by the standards of Western Europe, second tier.
What is really f_cked up is the real estate market. Our construction permit bureaucracy would make the Byzantine courts blush, a normal block of flats may spend a decade in permission limbo before the first shovel touches the ground. As a result, prices have gone absolutely mad in the last few years, especially in Prague.
(Meanwhile, similarly sized Polish capital Warsaw built 100 000 apartments in five years or so and housing is much more affordable there as a consequence.)
I'm Canadian and since living abroad I can only say how impressed I am with health care systems OTHER than Canada's. Getting a specialist appointment in Canada can take weeks to months and even then the specialist barely has time for you.
I have friends from Europe who (now) have dual citizenship and fly back to their country of origin for anything beyond a basic checkup.
In Asia I go to the hospital and I get all the results in a folder and can review them myself. There are no hidden mysteries like in Canada -- what are they hiding in Canada? I've asked for a copy of my medical file and they've looked me like I'm a lunatic!
In Canada:
"So when do I get my test results?"
"We'll call you if there is a problem."
No joke!
In Quebec I always have to pay $500 a year for medical -- I guarantee you I can get A+ coverage for that amount of money in any SEA country. So it's definitely not "free".
Canadian health care is most certainly a better financial deal than the US system if stories are to be believed. But it's most certainly not the best world wide.
How often do you, personally, use healthcare? I was fine with it too because I'm a very healthy man (let's face it, men don't use health care as much as women for obvious biological reasons) in my 30's. The fact it's so shit doesn't affect me, personally.
But it's objectively bad when compared to every country at our level of income, and bad when compared to most first-world countries. We pay more and receive less. My girlfriend is pregnant (part of the reason for all her medical appointments) and legitimately doesn't want to move back to Canada (where we met) because of the state of health care (and education, and infrastructure, and housing costs, but healthcare is a big one with a child on the way).
Edit - in a comment to another person you're saying you're OK with things being postponed in Canada because it's a pandemic. Nothing is postponed or shut down here... We've been getting appointments just fine. Literally made my point.
No Canadians are not satisfied. It's the biggest complaint of everyone outside of the top few large cities.
The government is clueless, but also the healthcare isn't very good beyond common issues.
It's not like in the US where you have multibillion dollar facilities dedicated to a disease.
Unfortunately the same doctor treating you for cancer is the same doctor putting stitches in some kids finger at the local hospital and not a specialized medical team at the Johns Hopkins Center.
Everything here is treated with Amoxicillin, Tylenol, and if they trust you enough with the hard drugs, maybe some diclofenac.
