Health-care iceberg
Posted on August 10, 2012 in Health Debates
Source: Globe & Mail — Authors: Sid Frankel
TheGlobeandMail.com – commentary/letters
30 July 2012. Sid Frankel
The Council of the Federation and its health-care-innovations working group have suggested useful measures to reorganize purchasing, health-care delivery and evaluation (Premiers Take Health-Care Reins – July 27). But they can be accused of reorganizing the deck chairs while ignoring the iceberg: Persistent poverty and inequality are the most powerful determinants of health status and, therefore, health-care expenditure. The federal government has increased the size of the iceberg with its eligibility restrictions on Old Age Security and Employment Insurance.
Canadian physician and health analyst Michael Rachlis estimates that poverty accounts for at least 20 per cent of all health-care costs. The premiers ignore this at their peril. No one remembers the crew of the Titanic for making service more efficient by reorganizing deck chairs, but rather for causing a disaster by ignoring reality.
Sid Frankel, associate professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Manitoba
Tags: budget, featured, Health, ideology, standard of living
This entry was posted on Friday, August 10th, 2012 at 11:39 pm and is filed under Health Debates. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
4 Responses to “Health-care iceberg”
|
Recent Comments
La vie a été très simple, mais nous avons aussi ne pouvait pas l’aider à devenir très compliqué.
Je préfère traiter avec des lignes parallèles ne se croisent jamais, cependant, a été la mer à garder belle. Parce que si – une fois se croisent, après ce point sera plus éloignés.
Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.
I’d rather and you are parallel lines, forever won’t intersect, but could have been facing keeps good. Because if – denier, that points intersect the farther the away.