(FB031)

More Private Healthcare in Canada?

Executive Summary

A new book puts Canada’s Medicare system in context by describing the private healthcare sector in other countries with universal access.

The economic principles that shaped Medicare categorize healthcare as a good significantly different from others that operate successfully in a market.

Universal access healthcare programs take two forms, one that treats it as social insurance and one that considers it to be social welfare.

Although Britain’s National Health Service is based on the latter, it has veered quite sharply towards the creation of internal markets that mimic a competitive process.

The insurance-based systems in France, Germany and Belgium have multiple insurers and vibrant private sectors of healthcare providers.

Sweden and Australia adopted programs funded by general taxation, but neither country requires the strictly public provision of services.

One can fervently defend Medicare and still see the value of allowing the private sector a significant role in service delivery.

Read Pdf version (8 pages)

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Dennis Owens was the Frontier's Senior Policy Analyst (1997-2007). A descendant of homesteaders near Portage la Prairie, he graduated from the University of Winnipeg in 1970 with a Bachelor of Arts in English and Political Science. Over a 20-year career in the transportation business, he rose to the position of operations manager of a Winnipeg-based firm. Since then he has researched and written about Canadian public policy issues for a variety of organizations including the Manitoba Taxpayers Association and the Prairie Centre. His specialties at the Frontier Centre include municipal issues, public education, healthcare and aboriginal policy. His frequent exposure in electronic and print media has included a regular commentary on CBC radio and articles printed in the Wall Street Journal and the National Post

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• RE: More Private Healthcare? — April 17, 2005
  

  I'm very impressed by the work of your Centre. Keep up the good work. -E-mail from Angus Reid, Vancouver