Tuesday, October 16, 2007

The Truth About Government Run Health Care - Straight from Canada!!


Hillary Clinton is a huge proponent of Universal Health Care/Socialized Medicine. Those that support the idea proclaim that it's free health care for everyone. Michael Moore, in his movie, "Sicko," tried to explain how wonderful it would be to move our medical care into a socialist model, using Canada and Cuba as prime examples. I have a cousin in the San Francisco Bay area that constantly tells me that America needs to get up to speed with Europe. Democrats are even now pushing the SChip medical care program for kids of middle class families in an attempt to inject socialized health care into the system under the guise of "It's for the children - to reject it means you don't love the children."

I don't buy any of it, nor will I ever.

Don't get me wrong, the existance of government funded programs for people in need on a temporary basis is a blessing to many people that suddenly find themselves in a bad spot. However, the idea of these programs is that they should be a temporary fix until the person, or family, can replace the government assistance with private health care or employment sponsored health care. Welfare type programs should never be used on a permanent basis, nor should the government put a program in place that requires participation.

I have often asked myself, what if I don't want Hillary Care? What if I would prefer to pay for my own medical seperately?

Under Socialized Medicine that freedom is taken away by the government.

I thought this was supposed to be the land of the free.

John Bootie, Independent Candidate for the 2008 Presidency, recently received this e-mail from a friend who received it from another friend living in Canada.

Who better to tell us how wonderful or how crappy the Universal Health System is in Canada than a Canadian?

Well, if anything, for those of you considering moving away from freedom, and into the shackles of Government-run Health Care, this e-mail may open your eyes.

I saw on the news up here in Canada where Hillary Clinton introduced her new health care plan. Something similar to what we have in Canada. I also heard that Michael Moore was raving about the health care up here in Canada in his latest movie. As your friend and someone who lives with the Canada health care plan I thought I would give you some facts about this great medical plan that we have in Canada.

First of all:

1) The health care plan in Canada is not free. We pay a premium every month of $96 for Shirley and I to be covered. Sounds great eh. What they don't tell you is how much we pay in taxes to keep the health care system afloat. I am personally in the 55% tax bracket. Yes 55% of my earnings go to taxes. A large portion of that and I am not sure of the exact amount goes directly to health care our #1 expense.

2) I would not classify what we have as a health care plan, it is more like a health diagnosis system. You can get into to see a doctor quick enough so he can tell you "yes indeed you are sick or you need an operation" but now the challenge becomes getting treated or operated on. We have waiting lists out the ying yang some as much as 2 years down the road.

3) Rather than fix what is wrong with you the usual tactic in Canada is to prescribe drugs. Have a pain? Here is a drug to take- not what is causing the pain and why. No time for checking you out because it is more important to move as many patients thru as possible each hour for Government re-imbursement

4) Many Canadians do not have a family Doctor.

5) Don't require emergency treatment as you may wait for hours in the emergency room waiting for treatment.

6) Shirley's dad cut his hand on a power saw a few weeks back and it required that his hand be put in a splint - to our surprise we had to pay $125 for a splint because it is not covered under health care plus we have to pay $60 for each visit for him to check it out each week.

7) Shirley's cousin was diagnosed with a heart blockage. Put on a waiting list . Died before he could get treatment.

8) Government allots so many operations per year. When that is done no more operations, unless you go to your local newspaper and plead your case and embarrass the government then money suddenly appears.

9)The Government takes great pride in telling us how much more they are increasing the funding for health care but waiting lists never get shorter. Government just keeps throwing money at the problem but it never goes away. But they are good at finding new ways to tax us, but they don't call it a tax anymore it is now a user fee.

10) A friend needs an operation for a blockage in her leg but because she is a smoker they will not do it. Despite paying into the health care system all these years. My friend is 65 years old. Now there is talk that maybe we should not treat fat and obese people either because they are a drain on the health care system. Let me see now, what we want in Canada is a health care system for healthy people only. That should reduce our health care costs.

11) Forget getting a second opinion, what you see is what you get.

12) I can spend what money I have left after taxes on booze, cigarettes, junk food and anything else that could kill me but I am not allowed by law to spend my money on getting an operation I need because that would be jumping the queue. I must wait my turn except if I am a hockey player or athlete then I can get looked at right away. Go figger. Where else in the world can you spend money to kill yourself but not allowed to spend money to get healthy.

13) Oh did I mention that immigrants are covered automatically at tax payer expense having never contributed a dollar to the system and pay no premiums.

14) Oh, yeh, we now give free needles to drug users to try and keep them healthy. Wouldn't want a sickly druggie breaking into your house and stealing your things. But people with diabetes who pay into the health care system have to pay for their needles because it is not covered but the health care system.

I send this out not looking for sympathy but as the election looms in the states you will be hearing more and more about universal health care down there and the advocates will be pointing to Canada. I just want to make sure that you hear the truth about health care up here and have some food for thought and informed questions to ask when broached with this subject.

Step wisely and don't make the same mistakes we have.

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