A comparison of US and Canadian healthcare, Using babies! Options

[mipadi]

United States

• Wife with previa placenta, c-section, 9 days hospital - $50k+
• Son 3 weeks immature, 3 weeks in NICU - $140K+

Welcome to American health care. I do have insurance so with that it will be about $20K out of pocket for me. And most importantly my son is now 5 weeks old and thriving.

Canada

I'm a Canadian in Canada, father of two. I created an account specifically after reading the above comment. This isn't a horror story, or even a story of near-disaster, just what happened, but I couldn't help but notice a contrast.

In the last weeks of my wife's first pregnancy, she began experiencing some stomach pain. We went to the hospital, she was checked out with a bevy of tests, discharged, and sent home when she appeared to be doing better. Gas, we all thought. After more pain a few days later, and some discussion with the nurse over the phone, we agreed that this needed to be checked again. My wife was diagnosed with an unusual affliction that can affect pregnant women, and that it was best treated with the baby removed.

They tried to induce labour (to no effect), she was given an epidural, and eventually it was decided that this was best handled with a cesarean. The deed done, all was well. Mom and child #1 stayed in the hospital for a few days, receiving checkups and the assorted 200-point-inspections that newborns seem to need. I brought them home, life was good. A nurse came to our home within a couple of weeks to see if we needed anything. At some point my wife went in to a nursing clinic at the hospital to get help with breastfeeding.

Pregnancy #2 came along a couple of years later. As a consequence of history, there were a couple of extra appointments with the obstetrician, an extra ultrasound (I think)...and about three weeks before the due date, my wife started getting pains again. The ob's general take was "let's not mess around - let's just go with the cesarean...how 'bout this weekend?" Another surgery, another stay of a few days.

I paid for parking. I paid to get some photos of the ultrasound in a cutesy envelope, and I paid something like $10 or $15 so my wife would have a phone in the hospital room. I never saw a bill. I don't know how much all this cost. I'd never think this is all that remarkable except that I keep hearing that it is.

I don't really know what things are like in the U.S. I hear horror stories, of course, but I've learned not to trust what you're told about a foreign health care system. I don't know what it's like in the UK or France since I've never lived there.

As for what goes on in Canada...I don't suppose it comes as a surprise to most of the crowd on this particular board to be told that you are being lied to. Horribly, horribly lied to. As the debate rages on in your country, my wife and I are frequently exposed to the things you're being told about the system in my country. She laughs out loud, and my stomach turns.

This isn't a polemic. I don't know that you can really walk away with more than "I heard from some guy that it's not so bad." You folks should do what's best for you and your country, but you deserve good information and a good debate to make your choice.

[NoSex]

I'm going to compare this to the microprocessor industry, because comparing things to computer parts always makes things easier for me to word.

i'm going to argue that this is a false analogy. really, as will be any comparison to so-called competitive markets. for one, healthcare is a market unlike any other. it simply does not resemble any form of traditional economic model, for this... these forms of comparison often fail. lastly, a profit motive is something that some find dubious in the case of healing the sick & keeping people healthy. the problem is that the private industry actually makes more money from people 1) being sick, 2) not getting the care they need. this is why, for example, the healthcare industry spends billions of dollars hiring people to dig up information that would deny their customers coverage.

if i were to make a comparison... amd and intel don't higher tech nerds to make sure your shit doesn't work the way it's supposed to.

No. I hear the private industry guarantees job security, allows their employees to be lazy, and does not employ a rather large amount of Americans giving them disposable income and giving the government taxes.

is general motors job security? what about the steel industry workers? no, i'm fairly postive the most secure jobs you can get... are government positions. nonetheless, i'm speaking very specifically about the way the healthcare industry is choking other sectors of the economy. it's something i don't believe can be easily denied. not to mention, the cost alone is by far more threatening to the consumer than say, income taxes... and, while those taxes are being decreased on obama's tax plan, the costs of healthcare are rising five times faster than our wages[1].

Also what's with this state's rights thing? I hear that's unconstitutional and the federal government was always meant to be more powerful and a big powerful government has always worked!

i'm a federalist. i don't think delegating powers to smaller bodies is a way to fix our problems. to me, that's cowardly.