Private clinics and the threat to public health care

Health care privatization promoters would have you believe that the only way to improve Canada’s health care system is to open it to private, for-profit interests. Private clinics are operating across the country offering health care services for a price, and the federal government is doing nothing to stop it.

Dr. Brian Day, a private clinic owner in B.C. and past president of the Canadian Medical Association, is leading the charge to have provinces allow for-profit clinics where patients could pay directly for access to doctors, treatments and surgeries. British Columbia and Quebec are already hotbeds for these clinics, while other provinces – such as Alberta and Nova Scotia – allow them to a lesser extent. A 2008 report by the Ontario Health Coalition found that there are 130 private clinics open in five Canadian provinces, and provided evidence that 89 of these clinics may be selling services in violation of the Canada Health Act.

Private clinics typically charge 10 to 15 per cent more than the public sector for procedures to cover administration costs and shareholder profits. At the same time, these clinics draw doctors and other health care professionals away from the public system, which already faces shortages. The result? There are longer wait times in the public system for people who can’t afford to pay high enrolment and annual fees, or inflated surgical costs.

The federal government must enforce the letter and the spirit of the Canada Health Act and enact strong penalties on provinces that allow private clinics. Federal and provincial governments need to work together to ensure a strengthened public health care system that provides timely, quality health care services to all Canadians.

Resources:

• Fact sheet: The Myths of For-Profit Health Care

• Fact sheet: The myth of the ‘European solution’