Anyone In Canada Recognize the Utopia Michael Moore Sees There?

[treis]

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]

But if you’re an elderly person looking for a hip replacement, good luck. If you’re an elderly person needing cataract surgery, get yourself a dog to walk your blind butt around for a year or two, because that’s how long on average people are waiting for that type of surgery. If you need to see a spcialist, the wait can be brutal. If you’ve got a suspicious lump and want the right kind of doctor to look at it, you can wait months. Costs are skyrocketing, we have shortages of nurses and doctors, and we’re beginning to lag in some key metrics like various cancer survival rates, probably because people can’t get in to take advantage of early detection.
[/QUOTE]

What a load of crap. According to this report about 75% of cataract and joint replacement patients wait less than 3 months. They only break it down between under 1 month, 1-3 months, and over 3 months. I have no data to show it, but I suspect that the number of people waiting 1-2 years is vanishingly small. Certainly not what the average person waits.

I’m not going to look up each of the other “facts” you mentioned, but judging by the accuracy of your first contention I doubt they are anywhere close to the truth.

Besides, as with all other countries, the U.S. spends approximately twice the amount per capita on health care. By spending that much more money the U.S. should be heads and shoulders above the rest of the world. We aren’t because our system of health care is much less efficient than the socialized health care in other Western nations.

[John_Mace]

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
Actually, I picked it by googling “U.S. cities by size”, then going down this list, which was the first hit in the search, until I found the first city under 1,000,000 in population, which happened to be San Jose. I had no idea what it’s crime rate was. That’s the honest truth. I wasn’t stacking the deck in any way.
[/quote]

OK. But it’s San Jose that is the outlier in large US cities, not Detroit.

BTW, Canada’s average rate per 100,000 population for burglaries and vehicle thefts is higher than the U.S. average rate. The rate for homicide is about 1/3 of the U.S. rate, and the rate for robbery is about half. So the notion that we don’t have to lock our doors and live in total safety is ridiculous. We’re more likely to have our cars stolen and our houses broken into than you are.

I agree that the notion that Canadians don’t have to lock their doors is ludicrous. We don’t need to cite any data to “prove” that.

[Least_Original_User_Name_Ever]

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
As for the relative safety of Canada vs the US: Here in Edmonton, we lock our doors. I know many people who have had their homes burgled. I’ve had vehicles broken into several times. A co-worker had his car stolen out of our parkade last year, and several more had their windows broken and their contents stolen. In fact, our offices were burgled for computers twice in the last three years. Home burglaries are reasonably common. But I think you’ll find the same thing you find in the U.S.: If you live in a middle-class neighborhood in the ‘burbs’, you’re reasonably safe. If you live in the inner-city, you’re not. It’s just that the U.S. has huge cities with large inner-city areas that drive crime rates up.

If you want to compare crime rates on an apples-to-apples basis, let’s try comparing Saskatchewan to Montana. Both midwest populations, both regions are roughly the same in population size. Saskatchewan has a couple of cities that are larger than the largest in Montana, but no huge metropolises with inner city problems.

In 2004, Saskatchewan had 15,159 criminal incidents for every 100,000 population. In Montana, the number in 2005 was 3,424. Saskatchewan had almost five times the crime rate of Montana. But how about all those gun-related murders? In Montana, where handguns are widely and easily obtainable, there were 18 murders. In Saskatchewan, where they are heavily controlled, there were 39. Over twice the murder rate, too.

The other thing we could do to examine apples to apples would be to take two cities of comparable size and demographic layout, and compare crime statistics. Let’s start with Edmonton.

Edmonton Crime per 100,000 population

Murder: 2.2
Robbery: 162
Break-ins: 1,020
Motor Vehicle Theft: 951

cite.

Now let’s pick a similar U.S. city, with a population around 800,000, with a strong economy and large middle class. How about San Jose, California:

2003 Crime rates for San Jose per 100,000 population:

Murder: 3.1
Robbery: 88.1
Burglary: 358.3
Vehicle Theft: 396.1

cite.

Well, what do you know - in a ‘safe’ Canadian city with a population just under 1 million, you’re far more likely to have your vehicle stolen, your house burgled, or to be robbed than you are in the dangerous American city of San Jose. The only stat that is worse in the U.S. is the murder rate, but that’s such a small number that annual differences can swing the ‘winner’ in either direction. In fact, if I had chosen 2005 for my stats, Edmonton would have ‘won’ that stat too, as we had 37 murders for a murder rate just over 4 per 100,000.

Now, let’s look at Detroit, Mi. Another city of roughly the same size as Edmonton and San Jose. But the numbers are horrid:

Crimes per 100,000 population:

Murder: 39.3
Robbery: 757
Burglary: 1698
Vehicle Theft: 2362

There’s your outlier. The difference isn’t between Canada and the U.S. The difference is between cities like Detroit and cities like San Jose or Missoula Montana. It’s not gun control. It’s not the nature of the Canadian people. It’s not a difference between the two countries at all. The answer is much more complex. But complexity isn’t a word in Michael Moore’s vocabulary. He’s rather play the demogogue and reach for simplistic solutions that happen to align with his political philosophy.

In Edmonton, the crime rate has been skyrocketing primarily because of the increase in gang activity and the deterioration of the inner-city areas. If we could take just the inner-city area of Edmonton and work out the crime rates, I’ll bet it would look a lot like Detroit. For example, the bulk of our murders happen in the inner city, even though it probably makes up 10% of the population or less.

I think you’ll find that if you map crime across the U.S., the pattern does not even remotely follow something as simple as gun control laws. It’s more about poverty, gang-related activity, local criminal enterprises, and other complex factors.
[/QUOTE]

You’re aware that there are OTHER distinctions that people can draw between Detroit and San Jose/Missoula. Here’s some crap I dug up for ya as well, with gun deaths. No map was handy, but here are some stats from Connecticut.

[Sam_Stone]

[QUOTE=Least Original User Name Ever]
You’re aware that there are OTHER distinctions that people can draw between Detroit and San Jose/Missoula. Here’s some crap I dug up for ya as well, with gun deaths. No map was handy, but here are some stats from Connecticut.
[/QUOTE]

Yes, I’m aware of that. That’s why I said the problem was complex.

I have no idea what point you’re trying to make with your ‘gun facts’ link. It seems like the typical context-free summary you see on partisan sites everywhere. I certainly wouldn’t be able to draw any conclusions from perusing those stats. Was there a point you wanted to make with it?

[Bill_Door]

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
But if you’re an elderly person looking for a hip replacement, good luck. If you’re an elderly person needing cataract surgery, get yourself a dog to walk your blind butt around for a year or two, because that’s how long on average people are waiting for that type of surgery.
[/QUOTE]

It’s just a single data point, but in September of 2002 I noticed a visual field defect in my left eye, and notified my primary care physician immediately. They tried to give me an appointment with an opthalmologist three weeks from then. I knew it was more critical than that, and leaned on them, and they reluctantly gave me an appointment in a week. Five days after the first symptom, my retina peeled off the back of my eye. Despite several surgeries I have never seen anything in that eye again. Retinal tissue is nerve tissue, and it doesn’t grow back.

The retinal specialist I ended seeing said that had I been treated immediately, he could have guaranteed ambulatory vision in that eye, and a pretty good chance of being able to read with it.

This was in New York, and I had the most expensive of the three tiers of medical coverage offered by my employer.

But, in some ways doesn’t the Canadian system stand on the shoulders of the US system? The Canadian system is best at driving the care down to the most amount of people, and provides good care at low cost. The US system is best at being out there on the cutting edge of technology and using new procedures, drugs, and equipment too expensive to use in a not-for-profit system that eventually become commonplace. It was the US demand for diagnostic equipment that drove down the price of CAT, MRI, and PET scanning equipment. Sure, the Brits invented the CAT scanner, but it was the US that bought enough of them to bring the price down enough for everyone to afford them.

[Least_Original_User_Name_Ever]

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
Yes, I’m aware of that. That’s why I said the problem was complex.

I have no idea what point you’re trying to make with your ‘gun facts’ link. It seems like the typical context-free summary you see on partisan sites everywhere. I certainly wouldn’t be able to draw any conclusions from perusing those stats. Was there a point you wanted to make with it?
[/QUOTE]

I know. I was semi-backing you up about it.

The link was just for information’s sake. There was no point over it at all.

Then again, if you wish to blot it out with your hands by putting quotation marks around it and belittling it, then it doesn’t matter WHAT I post or link to.

[Rick]

Before I left my previous job I traveled to Canada 6-8 times a year for the last 10 years or so. While I was there, I would read the Canadian papers (Globe and Mail or Vancouver Sun typically).
I cannot recall a trip where I did not read of some Canadian or group of Canadians that were having trouble getting adequate health care.
This has led to what I believe they call a two tier system, where wealthy Canadians are either going private doctors/clinics or traveling to the US to get medical care. From what I recall a lot of these clinics were for MRI, and other specialized diagnostic work. The kicker is that this care is paid for cash. So not only are they getting taxed and they are then paying for their own care on top of their taxes. :eek: In addition when I was in Vancouver in Jan /Feb of this year, I recall reading that one of the provinces was trying to outlaw these private clinics. I guess because it isn’t fair to a regular wage earner.
The story that stuck in my mind the most was about a Canadian that had a cardiac event in Orlando Florida. He was admitted to a hospital in Florida diagnosed, stabilized, and scheduled for the procedure that he needed in about 2 days. He was visited by someone from the Canadian consulate who offered to charter a plane to take him home, where he could get health care. He asked when he could expect to get the procedure done if he took them up on their offer. Three to six months was the reply. He elected to stay in the US, and get it done the following day.
The point the article made was that the US has the best health care money can buy.

[XT]

Well, anecdotal info is always suspect. I think just like Sam’s anecdote about his families medical problems in Canada there are plenty of folks who have no problems at all with the system. Guess what? Just like horror stories in the US, there are plenty of folks who have had no problems. For my part the only problems I’ve ever had with the US system was with experimental procedures that the insurance company didn’t want to have done for my daughter…and at a guess Canadian or European medical systems wouldn’t have paid for them either.

For anything else I’ve had no issues. A few weeks ago my gall bladder went south. I went to the emergency room, they ran a series of tests on me trying to figure out what was wrong, finally giving me an MRI and determining what the problem (probably) was. I saw a surgeon the next day, who sent me to the main hospital for a sonogram (I felt like I was pregnant ), they did their thing, got back to the surgeon that day…and he scheduled me for surgery the day after.

Though my gall bladder turned out to be incredibly infected and on the verge of bursting (I didn’t even know they did that), the surgeon took it out with no fuss, no muss…end result 4 very small scars and a bit of pain (the worst effect thus far is my inability to eat pizza or spicy foods…nearly a death sentence here in New Mexico ).

And this is the 4th major operation I’ve had. No problems with the system here. I’m far from a ‘rich’ person…and I’m probably the wealthiest person in my extended family.

What does this touching anecdotal story mean? Nothing really. It just illustrates that some people have no problems (or few) with the system, while others have major problems with the system. I could give stories from other members of my extended family (who are as poor as you can get in this country) that are equally good…or would make your hair stand on end they are so bad. And at a guess, there are folks in Canada (and Europe) that could do the same…in fact, I KNOW folks in Canada AND in Europe (well, in the UK and France mainly) that have had good experiences with their medical system…and VERY bad ones. As bad as anything even the poorest of my family have had (and some much better than even the best care I’ve gotten…or at least as good).

As I do with other folks tales, take my own stories with the grain of salt they deserve…but also take the hair raising type with the same grain. And remember about that grass and how green it REALLY is on the other side of the fence…

-XT

[XT]

p.s. Oh yeah…and remember that FF Michael Moore? At a guess HE doesn’t go to either Canada OR Europe (or Cuba either )to get medical treatment. He just makes a shit load of money off telling us all how much better the system is in those other places…

Just some food (the spoon-fulls of which MM doesn’t seem to be missing any of) for thought.

-XT

[Plan_B]

Getting back to the OP, Lindsay McCreith is probably not a Doper, or is perhaps too ill to participate in this thread. So I’ve included this link to his story, as well as some other info about Canada’s health care system:

Opinion & Reviews - Wall Street Journal

[chappachula]

[QUOTE=Rick]
The point the article made was that the US has the best health care money can buy.
[/QUOTE]

That’s great , of course…but only if you have the money to buy it.
For every story of great care, there’s a counterbalancing story of terrible care—somebody who died because his employer went bankrupt and he had no insurance coverage.

I have found that instead of asking Americans and non-Americans to compare their heath systems, there is a better way to evaluate the quality of care:

In each country, listen to friends as they talk casually among themselves about their medical issues.

1: In Canada:------
First friend: " I’m gonna have my gall bladder removed, boy am I scared"
Second friend: " good luck with that, hope it goes well. I hope is isn’t too painful, or takes too long"

2: In the USA:----
first friend, “I’m gonna have my gall bladder removed, boy am I scared”.
Second friend: WOW–how much will that cost? Is it covered by your employer?

The entire psychology is different.
Americans expect the best, and then panic when the price drives them close to bankruptcy.
Canadians and Europeans only hope for the best, but don’t even ask what the price is.

I have had the above conversations, in different countries. Everybody worries about being hospitalized. But in my experience, it’s the Americans who have more nightmares than the non-Americans.
Non-Americans worry about the pain of the knife, knowing that it may take a couple months to return to routine again. But Americans worry about the pain of huge debts, NOT knowing if they will ever get back to routine life again.

[Jackmannii]

Testimonials, whether or not filtered through a pre-existing viewpoint, are not a good way to evaluate health care systems.

The best way is through objective measures - i.e. outcomes.

[Malthus]

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
There’s another thing socialized systems are terrible at: Innovation. With all the complaining Americans are doing about the cost of drugs being cheaper in Canada, they don’t tend to notice that most of those drugs were designed by American companies. When it comes to drugs, medical devices like shunts, artificial heart valves, and mechanical limbs, America leads the way. And why? Because a free-market system has wealthy ‘early adopters’ to fund that activity. Early adopters are critically important. Imagine where technology would be without them. The first VCRs and DVD players were $2,000. But they could be marketed because wealthy peoople would buy them, and eventually quantities of scale and improved manufacturing processes drove the price down for the masses. Most of the exotic safety systems in cars today, such as ABS brakes, stability control, rear obstacle sensors, side curtain airbags, etc. Were first developed for expensive luxury cars for the wealthy, and the technology trickled down.

In a single-payer system, we have no early adopters. We have no incentive for a company to make a device that will sell for $100,000 and be used by 500 people. The government won’t accept it or allocate the resources to patients to allow them to buy it. So we rely on the innovation of the U.S. free market system, and we’re the recipients of the trickle-down. That’s another reason why Canadians pay slightly less on average for our health care. But if you guys go down the same path, where’s the innovation going to come from?
[/QUOTE]

It is unlikely Canada would be a “leader in medical innovation” no matter what system it adopted. The reason is quite simple: Canada’s population is 1/10th that of the US.

Any “innovative” medical product is going to have a market 10 times the size of Canada’s in the US. All things being equal, the US will always be a better place to lanch an innovative product designed to aid a small percentage of the population - because the US will have a larger total number of people eligible to use the product.

[Merijeek]

[QUOTE=xtisme]
p.s. Oh yeah…and remember that FF Michael Moore? At a guess HE doesn’t go to either Canada OR Europe (or Cuba either )to get medical treatment. He just makes a shit load of money off telling us all how much better the system is in those other places…

Just some food (the spoon-fulls of which MM doesn’t seem to be missing any of) for thought.

-XT
[/QUOTE]

Wow, an GD post that contains a bunch of unsupported attacks, an overuse of smilies, and what I can only guess is calling someone “fat” - unless FF stands for “Fantastic Four.”

That was helpful. You brought a lot to the table. Thanks. Please try to avoid including any extra unnecessary smilies in your certainly-to-be pithy response.

-Joe

[XT]

[QUOTE=Merijeek]
Wow, an GD post that contains a bunch of unsupported attacks, an overuse of smilies, and what I can only guess is calling someone “fat” - unless FF stands for “Fantastic Four.”
[/QUOTE]

Unsupported attacks? Are you saying A) MM isn’t fat? B) MM doesn’t use US medical facilities, B1) Instead he uses the medical facilities in Canada/Europe/Cuba in preference, C) That he’s not rich, D) That he hasn’t made this money by a series of ‘documentaries’ telling us all how bad things are?

Are you asking me to CITE this stuff?? Would you like a cite that the sky is blue as well??

As for my ‘overuse of smilies’…well, I’ve never seen the guildlines for how many smilies are allowed per word. Perhaps if you would like to link me the house rules on the SDMB for the prefered number of smilies I will try and follow that guildline in future. Or maybe I won’t unless the Mods start getting snippy about the use of smilies in a post…

[QUOTE=Merijeek]
That was helpful. You brought a lot to the table. Thanks. Please try to avoid including any extra unnecessary smilies in your certainly-to-be pithy response.
[/QUOTE]

Oh, no worries…consider it a public service. (thats one) Perhaps next time YOU could try and contribute something? (two). I know you have it in you. (three…and thats the winky smilie…for extra effect…)

-XT

[Merijeek]

[QUOTE=xtisme]
Unsupported attacks? Are you saying A) MM isn’t fat? B) MM doesn’t use US medical facilities, B1) Instead he uses the medical facilities in Canada/Europe/Cuba in preference, C) That he’s not rich, D) That he hasn’t made this money by a series of ‘documentaries’ telling us all how bad things are?

[/QUOTE]

Sorry, I guess I mistook

At a guess

to mean “unsupported”.

Am I incorrect? I’m sure you have a cite. That would clear this all up.

As for your use of smilies, it’s not that there’s a rule or guideline, it’s that you appear to use them as a way of say, “I’m making a wildly asinine point here, but I’m putting smilies so that means I really shouldn’t be called on it because I apparently don’t mean it enough for anyone to bother questioning it”.

-Joe

[Malthus]

[QUOTE=Rick]
Before I left my previous job I traveled to Canada 6-8 times a year for the last 10 years or so. While I was there, I would read the Canadian papers (Globe and Mail or Vancouver Sun typically).
I cannot recall a trip where I did not read of some Canadian or group of Canadians that were having trouble getting adequate health care.
This has led to what I believe they call a two tier system, where wealthy Canadians are either going private doctors/clinics or traveling to the US to get medical care. From what I recall a lot of these clinics were for MRI, and other specialized diagnostic work. The kicker is that this care is paid for cash. So not only are they getting taxed and they are then paying for their own care on top of their taxes. :eek: In addition when I was in Vancouver in Jan /Feb of this year, I recall reading that one of the provinces was trying to outlaw these private clinics. I guess because it isn’t fair to a regular wage earner.
The story that stuck in my mind the most was about a Canadian that had a cardiac event in Orlando Florida. He was admitted to a hospital in Florida diagnosed, stabilized, and scheduled for the procedure that he needed in about 2 days. He was visited by someone from the Canadian consulate who offered to charter a plane to take him home, where he could get health care. He asked when he could expect to get the procedure done if he took them up on their offer. Three to six months was the reply. He elected to stay in the US, and get it done the following day.
The point the article made was that the US has the best health care money can buy.
[/QUOTE]

I’m kinda in favour of a two-tier system. The socialized care is there for all of the routine medical stuff, paid for out of the taxes of the rich and poor alike; if you have the cash and want faster or more cutting-edge care, you can pay for it, over and above your tax payments. Seems to me to make the best of both worlds.

The way I envision it, there would be little unfairness in this, as those able and willing to pay would be using the socialized system for everything except those procedures they wish to expedite.

The problem with the “best health care money can buy”, of course, is that many simply don’t have the money to buy it. In a modern, first-world nation, it is simply unacceptable in my opinion that a large percentage of the population not have access to medical care for financial reasons. To my mind, socialized medicine is the same sort of ‘natural subject for socialization’ as a socialized police force or a socialized fire department - if you want “extra policing” you can hire a security company; there is in effect a “two-tier” system for security services in both countries. Why not for medicine?

[Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party]

It was the US demand for diagnostic equipment that drove down the price of CAT, MRI, and PET scanning equipment. Sure, the Brits invented the CAT scanner, but it was the US that bought enough of them to bring the price down enough for everyone to afford them.

But what has this got to do with private health care in America? America’s obviously going to drive down prices due to high demand simply because it’s a first world country, where good health care is expected, and it has a huge population, compared with other first world nations.

[Loach]

[QUOTE=xtisme]
Unsupported attacks? Are you saying A) MM isn’t fat? B) MM doesn’t use US medical facilities, B1) Instead he uses the medical facilities in Canada/Europe/Cuba in preference, C) That he’s not rich, D) That he hasn’t made this money by a series of ‘documentaries’ telling us all how bad things are?

Are you asking me to CITE this stuff?? Would you like a cite that the sky is blue as well??

As for my ‘overuse of smilies’…well, I’ve never seen the guildlines for how many smilies are allowed per word. Perhaps if you would like to link me the house rules on the SDMB for the prefered number of smilies I will try and follow that guildline in future. Or maybe I won’t unless the Mods start getting snippy about the use of smilies in a post…

Oh, no worries…consider it a public service. (thats one) Perhaps next time YOU could try and contribute something? (two). I know you have it in you. (three…and thats the winky smilie…for extra effect…)

-XT
[/QUOTE]

I am no fan of Michael Moore (which is a shame, I used to be a big fan) but I heard him talk about his own health care. According to him he pays dues to three unions (actors, writers, directors) each one has a health care plan. He never claims to have problems with health care. That doesn’t mean there isn’t a problem with the system.

[jshore]

[QUOTE=John Mace]
That’s a pretty vague argument to support your original claim. I have no reason to believe that things would be worse if you decoupled health insurance for your job, since most people would end up sticking with the same company they signed on with when they were young and healthy. If I switch jobs, I have to start from scratch on my insurance, and I generally won’t be covered for any pre-existing conditions no matter how generous the company’s health plan is. That’s the big problem.
[/QUOTE]

Well, I was not saying that it would necessarily be worse if you decoupled health insurance from jobs…just that it would not necessarily be better and could be worse…at least without considerable regulation. And, I still think that. There are still lots of issues to be dealt with: (1) Not everyone is healthy when they are young. I told the story of being denied coverage in my mid-20s (and I still consider myself to be generally healthy), which isn’t so far off the time period when people could be switching from their parents’ policy to one of their own. (2) There would still need to be regulations to control the insurance companies from effectively dropping coverage to people as they got older (and certain ones in particular got less healthy) by driving up their rates to unaffordable levels.

I’m not saying it can’t be done but there simply has to be a lot of regulation if one is committed to the idea that everyone is entitled to at least a basic reasonable level of health care because there are people out there that the insurance companies can predict with high probability they are going to lose money on (unless they charge those people rates that the people can’t afford to pay) and a company trying to maximize its profits won’t want to insure these people.