Canadian Health Care Information

A recent story in the Toronto Star asked about the ethics of treating medical tourists after they get home. The focus was on the doctor and the so-called dilemma that they faced in treating or not treating such patients. This story sadly points out yet again that in our healthcare system, there is more concern for the healthcare provider than the healhcare receiver, the patient. And there is more concern about people practising medical tourism than about the reality of Canadians suffering because of lack of access in Canada.

Where are the ethicists? Should they not be speaking for the suffering? Should they not be speaking about the ethical issues in healthcare including the ethics of no care? I hear them speaking against medical tourism or private healthcare, yet I see no one taking on the realities of our current Canadian healthcare.

Ethicists like to talk about fairness. Where is the fairness in our healthcare system that is not one tier but many tiered? Tier one is for those who are simply lucky. They are lucky enough to have a condition for which pain is not a feature and for which there are no waiting lines. Or they are simply lucky because on a particular day, all of the planets align such that they do receive their needed treatment in a reasonable time. Tier two is for those people with enough money such that they can simply bypass the system and find healthcare in private jurisdictions. Tier three is for those folks who have influence in the syustem. Most of these are insiders, for example doctors, nurses and booking clerks. They take care of their own and they have the power to offer queue jumping to others. Tier four is for those folks who "know someone" inside the system - like the mom whose father was the neighbor of the executive assistant to the chief of surgery. Tier five is for everyone else. Under this system, it is the least advantaged who suffer the most.

I see ethicists defending the ideals of Medicare; the advertised version, but they are not speaking about the realities of Medicare. We need our ethicists to speak.

Our primary ethical obligation is to relieve human suffering. We can do this by opening our eyes, hearts and minds to those people and places and practices that provide universal and accessible healthcare for all. Let's make the relief of suffering more important than the preservation of a false ideal.