Archive for the ‘Health Policy Context’ Category
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Rich-poor divide in Toronto’s hospitals
Wednesday, June 13th, 2012
June 13, 2012
Those walk-in patients who clog emergency departments with non-urgent ailments? Probably not your middle-class neighbours with their coughing, feverish children. The majority are low-income Torontonians with nowhere else to go… two lessons from Hospital Care for All. The first is that “very low-income people are using the parts of the health-care system that are in greatest crisis.” The second is that to reduce hospital use “people need the ability to pay for healthy foods, buy medicine and live in a healthy place where they can receive home care.”
Tags: Health, poverty
Posted in Health Delivery System, Health Policy Context | No Comments »
65 Shades of Grey [health care costs]
Tuesday, June 5th, 2012
June 5, 2012
Population aging has fuelled fears of skyrocketing health care costs… But often missing from the conversations are the factors that can have the biggest impact on health care spending because they have the largest impact on health. The most profound levers for change include reduced poverty, active living and home care. Paying attention to these factors will lead to more significant health care reform than any of the discussions that keep focusing solely on the existing system.
Tags: Health, poverty, tax
Posted in Health Policy Context | 4 Comments »
Homeless Joe: There are too many cracks in Ontario’s mental health system
Friday, June 1st, 2012
May 31 2012
In Toronto alone, on any given night, there are around 5,000 homeless people. As many as a third of them have a serious mental illness, like schizophrenia or severe depression… The result is a revolving door of crisis and hospitalization. The price tag for it, in Ontario alone, runs to the billions annually. And that’s just the cost to taxpayers. There is also the immeasurable cost in suffering… mental illness can not be viewed just as a health concern or tackled with one approach. The solutions cross federal, provincial and municipal political boundaries and run across multiple departments including health, education, social services, housing and corrections.
Tags: budget, disabilities, mental Health, poverty, standard of living
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Focus on children first in tackling mental health
Wednesday, May 9th, 2012
May 08 2012
… the Mental Health Commission of Canada released its blueprint for a national strategy to properly treat and support Canadians with mental illness. The comprehensive document covers every aspect of what needs to change – from how employers and schools handle mental illness to the need for more affordable housing and a reformed justice system that doesn’t criminalize illness. The danger now, though, is that rather than embracing the challenge, Harper may throw up his hands at the enormity of it all – and the seemingly high price-tag that comes with it.
Tags: mental Health, standard of living, youth
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Health reform? Ottawa must provide clarity
Thursday, April 26th, 2012
Apr. 26, 2012
While the CHA says there must be deductions from federal cash transfers for extra-billing “by medical practitioners or dentists in the province,” it’s unclear as to whether extra-billing by providers in another province automatically requires federal penalties… to the degree that providing such clarity is a key step toward meaningful public dialogue on health care in Canada, the federal government should do so. Clarity is one thing that’s clearly missing from current debates.
Tags: budget, Health, rights
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Health Canada isn’t helping Canadians cut salt intake
Friday, April 20th, 2012
Apr 19 2012
… why here in Canada is our fast food even more sodium-laden than in other countries? … Health Canada has indeed recognized that our sodium-rich foods are putting our health at risk. So what does this government agency do to help Canadians reach recommended targets? Not much… the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) will no longer police food labels. It’s just the latest in a number of moves that appear to be putting corporate health before the health of Canadians… With the government relinquishing its watchdog status, there is nothing to motivate companies to correct inaccurate and potentially misleading information that may make their products appear healthier.
Tags: Health, ideology, standard of living
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Ontario ombudsman could hold hospitals to account
Monday, April 9th, 2012
Apr 08 2012
Ontario is… the only province whose ombudsman cannot investigate hospitals and long-term care facilities… they would perform better if they were subject to the scrutiny of my office, like virtually every other provincial ministry, agency, board, tribunal and Crown corporation… Every year, we hear from hundreds of patients and their loved ones who say they’ve endured inadequate care, unsafe conditions, even neglect and abuse in hospitals.
Tags: budget, Health, standard of living
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When emotion prevails over cold, hard science in public policy
Tuesday, April 3rd, 2012
Dec. 02, 2011
Should we be crafting policy and spending money on the basis of exceptionalism? But how do we begin to answer that question when there’s no public consensus on the exact point where the general good is no longer served by the benefits to a few?… Exceptionalism is at the root of many public-policy issues where emotion, self-interest and personal experience conflict with the more dispassionate, evidence-based approach of science. And with good reason: The individual story changes everything in how we relate to a prickly policy issue
Tags: budget, Health, rights
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Women in the dark about massive Ontario study of female health
Sunday, March 25th, 2012
Mar 06 2012
The most useful chapters for women seeking practical guidance are: cardiovascular disease, diabetes, depression, reproductive health and older women’s health. The chapters on cancer and musculoskeletal conditions (arthritis, osteoporosis) identify gender disparities, regional disparities and socioeconomic parities, but they don’t tell women much about how to improve their odds… it could be a catalyst for change. Its research team estimates that if Ontario had a truly equitable health-care system, there would be 230,000 fewer people with disabilities and 3,373 fewer premature deaths in the province’s big cities.
Tags: Health, participation, standard of living, women
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The premiers want more health-care study? Seriously?
Tuesday, January 24th, 2012
Jan. 24, 2012
We don’t need more studies or committees. Every royal commission, provincial inquiry, independent analysis for the past five decades has come to the same basic conclusions about what we need to do reform medicare: * Control spending by limiting medicare coverage to essential treatments that work; * Modernize primary care by moving away from solo physician practices to interdisciplinary teams; * Create some kind of universal prescription drug plan; * Shift money from institutional care to home care … [and] … invest it in palliative care.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, Health, ideology, standard of living
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