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Policy Papers

“Health Care Solutions”

The Heritage Foundation
By Robert E. Moffit, Ph.D.
March 8, 2008
http://www.heritage.org/Press/Commentary/ed030808c.cfm
Moffit touts Regina Herzlinger’s book, “Who Killed Health Care?” Herzlinger asserts that the solution to current health care woes “isn’t to turn future decisions over to a mandarin class of government-appointed control freaks.” Rather, she supports shifting control to patients and insurance purchasers.

“The potential of private sector health care in Canada”

Canadian Health Care Consensus Group
By Brian Ferguson
October 2007
http://www.aims.ca/aimslibrary.asp?ft=1&fd=0&fi=0&id=1917&p=1
Author Brian Ferguson, an economics professor at the University of Guelph and AIMS Fellow in Health Care Economics suggests fixing Canada’s health care system woes requires more flexibility and an examination of more options.

“Re-Evaluating Health Care”

Atlantic Institute for Market Studies (AIMS)
By David Zitner
August 11, 2007
http://www.aims.ca/library/ReEvaluatingHealthCare.pdf
According to Dr. Zitner, “one of the main problems in Canada’s health care system is that ultimately everyone in the industry is responsible to the one paying the bills - the government. As such, doctors, clinics and administrators are accountable to the government instead of to patients.” He argues that if we want better health care, we have to measure patient satisfaction as well as costs.

“Sweden’s Single-Payer Health System Provides a Warning to Other Nations”

The National Center for Public Policy Research
By David Hogberg, Ph.D.
May 2007
http://www.nationalcenter.org/NPA555_Sweden_Health_Care.html
Dr. Hogberg criticizes the Swiss health care system in favor of a free-market approach. The author discusses the adverse affects of government-run health care including “ever-growing expenses” and a decrease in the quality of care.

“Clinicians wait too long for imaging results, says watchdog”

MedicalExchange.com
March 19, 2007
http://www.medicexchange.com/mall/departmentpage.cfm/MedicExchangeUSA/_81675/1059/…

Five health-care myths debunked by hard facts

Frontier Center for Public Policy
By Mark Milke
February 4, 2008
http://www.fcpp.org/main/publication_detail.php?PubID=2055

There are many misconceptions about the Canadian health system held by universal health care supporters on the other side of the border but, as Milke shows, the reality behind the myths is quite different.

“Medicare for All” Universal Health Care Would Not Solve the Problem of Rising Health Care Costs

National Center for Public Policy Research
By David Hogberg
September 2007
http://www.nationalcenter.org/NPA561.html

Health policy expert Hogberg analyzes the concept of “Medicare for all” and busts three common claims: 1) that Medicare for All will save on administrative costs; 2) that Medicare for All will provide quality care; and 3) that Medicare for All will be affordable.

Health Care in France: facing hard choices

Canadian Medical Association Journal
By Christina Lopes
November 6, 2007

Lopes explains where France has succeeded, but also the problems of the system and the difficult decisions that will have to be made in the near future as the chronically over-budget system has to begin charging new fees to keep it running.

Free Health Care?

Cato Institute
By Walter E. Williams
July 24, 2004
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=2753

Williams takes on the many flaws of the Canadian system, from fewer MRI machines to an exodus of doctors to more lucrative lands and shows why the belief that Canadian care is free is far from true.

Universal Health Care is the Wrong Prescription

The Heartland Institute
By Brian Schwartz
June 1, 2008
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=23230&CFID=5094370&CFTOKEN=95847219

Schwartz lays out the perils of using a single-payer government run health system to deliver care and reiterates that “[h]aving coverage does not guarantee getting medical care.”

Canadians begin waiting for surgery before getting on the “wait list”

Canadian Institute for Health Information
March 7, 2006
http://secure.cihi.ca/cihiweb/dispPage.jsp?cw_page=media_07mar2006_e

CIHI describes its recent report, which revealed that Canadians faced waits of weeks for consultations with specialists, diagnostic tests, and surgical procedures, including those for cancer, and that waits were not decreasing.