Canadian Health Care

I was talking with a Mohawk from Canada the other day. He spends about 8 or 9 months of the year down here in Florida. Unlike other Canadians he doesn't have to return to Canada after 6 months. It's one of the few advantages of being recognized as belonging to the First Peoples. A buddy of mine has the same deal but in reverse. He's a US citizen who owns property in Canada and can stay up there as long as he wants.

The Canadian said he'd move down to Florida full time except for US health care. He and his wife try to schedule most of their healthcare while up north.

US politicians go and on about the horrors of Canadian healthcare but I've yet to meet one Canadian who would give it up for what we have in the US. Of course, if you are wealthy or a politician with the best of US care the Canadian system might be a step down.

Right now I've the cheapest bronze plan I could scrape up money to pay for. Before that I went two years with no health insurance. There's a couple of times I should probably have gone to the hospital, but I sucked it up and took my chances. Socialized medicine doesn't look too bad to me. On the other hand, a totally open market system might not be bad either. Real open competition should bring prices down to earth.

Right now I'm a getting an up close and personal look at end of life care. The hospice people are good, but are locked into pretty tight constraints. They can't do some fairly simple things that could make life better for people. The patient would have to drop hospice, get medical treatment, then go back on hospice -with all confusion and messed up paperwork that would entail. Hospice and regular doctors don't really work together. It's a mess, all because of the way things are paid.

-Sixbears