Both sides retreated under cover of press statements claiming the other side was at fault. None of this is helpful. The provinces, for their part, should stop their suggestions that parts of the system will have to be privatized, that drugs, home care, surgery, all will require fees. Injecting a note of panic into the discussions does not help the situation. At the same time, it has to be acknowledged that, given current underfunding, a certain amount of health care is becoming inaccessible.
Eye surgery is an example.
Elderly patients with cataracts wait for as long as two years to have the operation that will restore their sight and with it their quality of life. Both federal and provincial ministers of health talk as though wild increases in health spending are inevitable as the population ages, but it's not clear from other countries' experiences that it should be so. In Britain, for example, research suggests that the age of a population is only marginally responsible for rising costs. Rather than battle over who gets to score political points with taxpayers' money, politicians on both levels need to be honest with the public about what can be achieved with the resources available. There needs to be open and depoliticized debate about how much as a society Canada is prepared to spend on health care, whether through taxation, other forms of funding or direct individual spending.