Americans who have used Health Canada implicitly debunk media's lies about Health Canada.

Bill Mann, "Americans Who've Used Canada's Health-Care System Respond to Current Big-Lie Media Campaign"

The scare ads and op-ed pieces featuring Canadians telling us American how terrible their government health-care systems have arrived - predictably.

There's another, factual view - by those of us Americans who've lived in Canada and used their system.

My wife and I did for years, and we've been incensed by the lies we've heard back here in the U.S. about Canada's supposedly broken system.

It's not broken - and what's more, Canadians like and fiercely defend it.

Example: Our son was born at Montreal's Royal Victoria Hospital. My wife got excellent care. The total bill for three days in a semi-private room? $21.

My friend Art Finley is a West Virginia native who lives in Vancouver.

"I'm 82, and in excellent health," he told me this week. "It costs me all of $57 a month for health care, and it's excellent. I'm so tired of all the lies and bullshit I hear about the system up here in the U.S. media."

Finley, a well-known TV and radio host for years in San Francisco, adds,

"I now have 20/20 vision thanks to Canadian eye doctors. And I haven't had to wait for my surgeries, either."

A Canadian-born doctor wrote a hit piece for Wingnut Central (the Wall Street Journal op-ed page) this week David Gratzer claimed:

"Everyone in Canada is covered by a single payer -- the government. But Canadians wait for practically any procedure or diagnostic test or specialist consultation in the public system."

Vancouverite Finley: "That's sheer b.s."


I heard Gratzer say the same thing on Seattle radio station KIRO this week. Trouble is, it's nonsense.

We were always seen promptly by our doctors in Montreal, many of whom spoke both French and English.

Today, we live within sight of the Canadian border in Washington state, and still spend lots of time in Canada.

Five years ago, while we were on vacation in lovely Nova Scotia, the Canadian government released a long-awaited major report from a federal commission studying the Canadian single-payer system. We were listening to CBC Radio the day the big study came out.

The study's conclusion: While the system had flaws, none was so serious it couldn't be fixed.

Then the CBC opened the lines to callers across Canada.

Here it comes, I thought. The usual talk-show torrent of complaints and anger about the report's findings.

I wish Americans could have heard this revealing show.

For the next two hours, scores of Canadians called from across that vast country, from Newfoundland to British Columbia.

Not one said he or she would change the system. Every single one defended it vigorously.

The Greatest Canadian Ever

Further proof:

Not long ago, the CBC asked Canadians (in 2004) to nominate and then vote for The Greatest Canadian in history Thousands responded.

The winner? Not Wayne Gretzky, as I expected (although the hockey great DID make the Top 10). Not even Alexander Graham Bell, another finalist.

The greatest Canadian ever?

Tommy Douglas.

Who? Tommy Douglas was a Canadian politician - and the father of Canadian universal health care.

Busting myths of Canadian national health care

The U.S. media, mainly the corporate media, but also the non-profit media (suckered in by dominant myths about the Canadian health care), undercut public support for a national health care system in the U.S., with cynical, distorting myths about the nature and quality of Health Canada.
See this site, " 'Mythbusters' by the Canadian Health Services Research Foundation" at Physicians for a National Health Program (an American organization, by the way).
Canada Health Services Research Foundation's "competent and scholarly analyses of health policy and financing provide a counterpoint to the dishonest and mendacious “research” produced by corporate and ideologue-funded institutions such as the Fraser Institute. In this series of briefs, CHSRF researchers refute many of the myths about the Canadian health system and publicly-financed health care in general."
Click to access these reports (in PDF) on the facts, to debunk the lies of Fox News and company:
* The myth that: User fees (i.e., copays) would stop waste and ensure better use of the health care system
* The myth that: For-profit ownership of facilities would lead to a more efficient health care system
* The myth that: A parallel private system would reduce waiting times in the public system
* The myth that: Canada has a communist-style healthcare system
* The myth that: Canadian doctors are leaving for the United States in droves

Arm yourselves with these facts, to counter the arguments that Canada's health system is a disaster. Polls show that Americans actually do support a national, government-initiated health care system. The only things that are standing in the way of this: (a) Americans are deceived of the facts by the corporate media, (b) America's congressional representatives are beholden to the health care and pharmaceutical companies from whom they receive campaign contributions.