The Creeping Privatization of our Healthcare System
Our Healthcare System
Canadians pride themselves on many things, and one of them is our healthcare system. And we should—the fact that we can see our primary care provider or go to the hospital and access free healthcare services is a big deal.
But we're going to let you in on a secret: our public health care system isn't the best in the world. In fact, compared to other high-income democratic nations, Canada's healthcare system often ranks better than just one nation - the United States. Yeah, it's a low bar we've been puffing our chests over.
And if the bar was low before, Canadian governments are bringing a shovel. Provinces like Ontario are grooming us towards privatization as the solution to the healthcare crisis through code phrases like innovative solutions or changing the status quo)
#1 Health is a Human Right
To be clear, health is a fundamental human right.
"The enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being without distinction of race, religion, political belief, economic or social condition" - World Health Organization.
Our health status is directly correlated with our quality of life, which impacts our ability to live. No one should get sick and die just because they are poor.
Good health requires access to health services, but it is also determined by other basic human rights, including access to safe drinking water and sanitation, nutritious foods, adequate housing, education and safe working conditions.
If you are reading that and thinking, but wait, Canada doesn't ensure everyone has clean water or adequate housing - you are right; we don't. We're already violating people's human rights in our country.
The fact that we (for now) have universal healthcare is an important first step toward upholding everyone's human rights, and getting rid of it is a step backwards, not forwards.
#2 Canada's Current Situationship with Healthcare
In the Constitution Act (1867), when Canada formed as a settler colonial state, the federal and provincial governments divided political responsibilities between federal and provincial powers. Since our understanding of medicine (and life expectancy) wasn't that advanced, healthcare was considered a provincial responsibility.
The Canada Health Act (1984) is a federal document that defines the five principles our healthcare system is supposed to uphold. These are universal, accessible, portable, comprehensive, and publically administered. The thing is, it's the provinces' job to uphold this act and the five principles, meaning they get to decide what falls under their provincial health coverage and what doesn't. For example, dentists, eye exams, and mental health - all could (and should) be covered under comprehensive services.
We haven't been doing a great job of upholding the Canada Health Act —and our healthcare system is riddled with systemic inequities. But these can't be solved by privatizing our healthcare system; in fact, evidence indicates that systemic inequities worsen with privatization.
#3 Our healthcare system is crumbling by design
During the very early days of the pandemic, we saw healthcare approach actual innovative solutions. Suddenly we could make family doctor appointments online and do therapy from the comfort of our couch. This showed us that when politicians want to take action, they can. It is equally important to understand that when they want to destroy something to further their own agenda - they can.
That is what Ford's government (as well as many other governments across the country) is currently doing to our healthcare system. Past governments didn't do the healthcare sector many sustainable long-term favours, but Ford is choosing to crumble our healthcare system so that he can privatize it and profit off it.
#4 Privatization isn't it
Privatization involves transitioning the management of major institutions from the hands of the government to corporate entities. Our government is supposed to work for the people, but private organizations work for profits; in our capitalistic framework, these two things cannot happen simultaneously.
The wealthy elite will move to private services, creating an inequitable two-tier system. Privatized systems attract top talent, resources and funding, while the "free" version of the service continues to go underfunded, lowering the quality of staff, resources and services. We know health is directly correlated to our ability to work, study and live: creating an official two-tier system would mean that some of us would have access to living healthy lives, and some of us would systemically be unable to.
It is also important to note that Canada is a settler-colonial state and that our systems are inherently rooted in colonization (and, therefore, white supremacy). We know that this has resulted in systemic inequities that have historically and presently marginalized communities that are racialized, gender diverse, queer, low-income and disabled. Privatization will worsen these existing social inequities.
#5 If it's not a good idea why are so many politicians creeping towards privatization?
We should make this clear; privatization is not a good idea if
you believe that health is a human right, that there are systemic inequities currently existing in Canada, and that meeting the basic needs of all people in Canada is something we should be striving towards, not striving away from.
If you believe this, as we do, then privatization is not the answer.
We are creeping towards privatization because our leaders, who designed this mess in the first place, don't believe that health is a human right and do not believe it is their job to provide essential services that center on care and people rather than profits.
In the case of Doug Ford - who is likely not an anomaly - he's also lining his friends' pockets.
A Two Tier System of haves and have nots.
Imagine a privatized emergency room: more money = more staff per patient - which probably means the staff are at least getting their salaries increased to match inflation.
Meanwhile, in our public system, Ford has made it impossible for nurses to increase salaries - a two-tiered system would do nothing to address and support nurses in the public system: it would only attract top nursing talent away from the public system, increasing overtime and staff shortages.
A privatized emergency room has more resources, including beds, screening equipment etc., allowing for better and more consistent access to primary care providers, better management of chronic illnesses, and fewer non-emergent visits to the emergency room.
Meanwhile, this opens a competing market for medical suppliers, making the cost and supply of medical equipment even more inaccessible to the public sector.
Shouldn't we be focusing on making a well-funded and accessible system the reality for all of us?
It won’t happen all at once
We all know the story of how a frog will jump from a boiling pot, but a frog in water that is slowly being boiled will stay until it dies. We aren't going from a public to a private system overnight: our leaders are making slow moves because they know they are making choices that would make the vast majority of us jump from the pot.
Look at how Ford created a situation in which nurses, who are already underpaid and overworked, were additionally fucked over by Bill 124, which limits their pay increase to 1% a year, which is less than inflation! Ford then waits nearly a year before suggesting "InnOvAtiVe SoLuTioNs" - he knows what he's doing. He even had an election to see if people wanted private healthcare but didn't mention it.
And Ford had 1.8 billion dollars allocated towards our healthcare system - as in it was in his own budget - and he didn't spend that?!? He just chose not to spend that money during a global pandemic (?!!!!).
If he wanted the healthcare system to "stay open, " he should have opened his purse strings (filled with public dollars) and spent the damn money.
It's time to Save our System
Most people want to see systems change in the healthcare system right now because of all the shortages, closures and long wait times. Privatizing healthcare would solve these problems for the super-wealthy. Most of us will still be using the public system, which would still be filled with all the problems we currently experience, only worse.
Public healthcare is flatlining across the country. Most provinces have a majority government, most of which are right-leaning - so the prognosis isn't good, but it doesn't mean we can't fight back.
Go to www.oncanadaproject.ca/findyourrep for the emails of your elected officials!
Resources to checkout:
Ontario Nurses Association (any nurses association)
savemedicare.ca
Decent Health and Work Network
Canadian Medical Association
Lead Now
