The average Canadian now lives two years longer than the average American.

Canada's infant mortality rate is now only 70% of that in the U.S., while American women are almost twice as likely to die during childbirth as their Canadian counterparts.
http://www.diemer.ca/Docs/Diemer-TenHealthCareMyths.htm

AMERICANS DON`T DESERVE to live as long or longer than Canadians, say republicans.


For all that is said about the health care system in Canada, such criticisms are really unwarranted, especially when compared to the American system of health care coverage. In terms of both cost and effectiveness, our neighbors to the north have us beat on both.
http://www.examiner.com/x-15955-Madison-Liberal-Examiner~y2009m8d10-Canadian-health-care-myths-you-might-not-have-known-about

AMERICANS DON`T DESERVE healthcare as effective and cost-efficient as Canadians, say republicans.


Canadians are afforded many benefits for their tax dollars, even beyond health care (e.g., tax credits, family allowance, cheaper higher education), so the end result is a wash. At the end of the day, the average after-tax income of Canadian workers is equal to about 82 percent of their gross pay. In the U.S., that average is 81.9 percent.
http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_12523427

AMERICANS DON`T DESERVE as much benefits for the same taxes as Canadians, say republicans.

Republicans; the Party of No.

to let HR 676 come up for a vote.

Thanks for the links, support for a SP system is growing.

It took years of nasty political fights for Canada (well the province of Saskatchewan really did the heavy lifting for us) to get the current system. It didn't happen over night and there were many steps.

http://history.cbc.ca/history/?MIval=EpisContent.html&series_id=1&episode_id=15&chapter_id=2&page_id=4&lang=E

a national health system from the choices that are championed.

How many times do we want to be fooled?

Thanks for the link.

Reply to critics of “Bait and switch: How the ‘public option’ was sold”
Posted by Andrew Coates MD on Saturday, Aug 8, 2009
by Kip Sullivan, JD


http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/08/08/reply-to-critics-of-%e2%80%9cbait-and-switch-how-the-%e2%80%98public-option%e2%80%99-was-sold%e2%80%9d/

"...There have been three cycles of health care reform in the last half century – 1970-73, 1992-1994, and 2007 to date. At the dawn of each cycle, single-payer legislation had already been introduced. But early in the cycle, single-payer legislation was “taken off the table” (to quote a statement Sen. Max Baucus now wishes he had never made). Each time the Democratic leadership chose instead market-based proposals that had no track record and no evidence to support them. Each time they favored reform deemed more “politically feasible” than single-payer because it left the insurance industry in place. In all three cycles, the alternative, market-based proposal was promoted by one or two policy entrepreneurs (that is to say, it wasn’t an idea that bubbled up from the grassroots).

Single-payer legislation was the first out of the chute during the 1970-1973 cycle. In January 1970, Sen. Ted Kennedy introduced what we would today call a single-payer bill. But Kennedy and other leading Democrats quickly abandoned single-payer in favor of a theory about cost containment called the “health maintenance strategy.” This strategy revolved around a new-fangled type of insurance company proposed by a Minnesota physician named Paul Ellwood that Ellwood called the “health maintenance organization.”


...Two decades later, when the 1992-1994 cycle opened, single-payer legislation was not only in place in Congress it had also been introduced in many states (the first state single-payer bill to be introduced was introduced in Ohio’s legislature in 1990). The first modern-day single-payer bill was introduced in the US House by Rep. Marty Russo (D-IL) in 1991 and in the Senate by Senator Paul Wellstone in 1992. But as was the case during the previous cycle, the Democratic leadership was seduced by an alternative to single-payer. Once again, Paul Ellwood played an important role in luring Democrats away from single-payer.


...The cycle we’re in now bears many similarities with the last two cycles. When this cycle began (2007 is as good a year to pick as the first year of this cycle, although that is somewhat arbitrary), single-payer legislation was better positioned than ever before to be taken seriously by Democrats. Single-payer bills had been introduced in several states as well as the US House (Sen. Bernie Sanders would introduce a single-payer bill in the Senate in 2008). Polls were showing that two-thirds of Americans and 60 percent of doctors support single-payer (or “Medicare for all”) legislation.

But once again an articulate policy entrepreneur appeared on the scene to sell a market-based alternative to single-payer that would leave the insurance industry at the top of the health care food chain, and once again the Democratic leadership fell for it. This time the entrepreneur was not Paul Ellwood. This time the policy entrepreneur was Jacob Hacker, a professor of political science at Berkeley. Just as Ellwood and the Jackson Hole Group had before him, Hacker said enhanced “competition” among insurance companies was the solution to the health care crisis. (The name of Hacker’s latest paper is “Healthy competition.”) This time enhanced competition would not come from “managing” competition, but from the creation of a “public option.” This time the coalition that promoted the alternative to single-payer was not the Jackson Hole Group, but HCAN, assisted by a sister coalition called the Herndon Alliance..."

I guess it could be both, but I look at our fast food, our obesity, our sedentary lifestyles etc and I can't help but think maybe its us.

On the other hand, does seeing a doctor help with obesity? Does a friendly lecture every once in a while along with a scary medical test change behavior?

Who knows.

We are pretty fat up here, eating all the same crap fast food as you. I think we drink a lot more as well.

I suspect the uninsured are seriously dragging down the US numbers. Wish they broke those measurements down for the insured vs uninsured.

I sure would love to understand the data better. I don't feel I know enough to evaluate all the options and I sure don't trust our politicians when I know they have significant conflicts of interest aka political contributions.

The life expectancy numbers are essentially what a the average newborn is expected to live to. This is a composite of all sorts of things--how long you live once you hit 60, what your chances of survival are for the first minute after birth, etc., etc. It includes the effects of childhood illnesses and midlife heart disease, the risk of skiing accidents, HIV, death during childbirth and the possibility of being killed during a robbery.

It means that the periods when you're insured and those when you're uninsured are incorporated into the overall figure. It includes men, who often would rather suffer than go to a doctor, and women, who tend to go to doctors more often when they're seriously ill.

It's an average across all racial and ethnic groups--blacks with their lower life expectancy, high-risk births where the kid would have surely died before being born and thus not included in earlier stats. It's a hodge-podge, and, again, is a prediction about newborns. It doesn't say a heck of a whole lot about me, since I'm 50--will I live to be 78.1 or whatever the OP's US life expectancy figure is? Probably not, if only because I'm past many of the risks; I'm white, so my life expectancy is higher than some groups; then again, I'm male, and women have a higher life expectancy and raise the average.

one thing i noticed prominently was how overly saturated the obsessiveness in fast food chains at every corner. It's incredible how many bad-for-the-heart food chains there are in the U.S. We have only the most popular food chains that have cross-bordered into Canada (there arent that many different ones) but the 10-20 other remaining chains running rampant in the U.S. is dizzying.

When interning for a year in California (thank god my Canadian healthcare crossed the border with me) i couldnt resist and tried several of these other food brands. A lot of these places are very dirty and smelly and their food tastes just like the other guy. But yet there were large lineups for all of them.

For me, after my experience, i think although we dont have as many varied food chains it doesnt mean that if they were here we wouldnt go nuts on them too, but with the reduced variety i am guessing we might be healthier but just a bit.

Healthcare without queston is better, obviously. It reallyt amazes me to this day as i read thru DU that this can actually be an issue with people on a daily basis. No one in our country would give up our free healthcare.

with such a large number, that's got to start affecting the overall life expectancy numbers.

the taxpayers dime, well, then the benifit is sky high...

In theory, at least.

We got that going for us.

:kick:

Insurance Companies dictate their health care than let a Democratic President implement a much better deal for them.

:kick:

They outlive us all, and then they take over the USA. Fiendishly clever.

Regime we Americans have for the last 8 yrs!

Actually, with little exception, we haven't had much reprieve from Repuke rule (Presidential or Congressional) for the last 40+ yrs. It's bound to leave a scar!

poutine.

spelling is deliberate.

It's because there aren't as many Canadians... duh!

:eyes:








:sarcasm:

On second thought, of course he said that...dumb as a pile of shit, that's rightwingnuts for ya.

:rofl: