Universal Health Care: What the United States Can Learn from the Canadian Experience [Paperback]

Pat Armstrong (Author), Hugh Armstrong (Author), Claudia Fegan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 1999

Now in paperback, a powerful argument for a new health care system. Polls show Americans increasingly unhappy with our health care system. Yet for nearly thirty years, our next-door neighbor has had a universal, public health insurance system that its citizens hail as their favorite social program. So why can't it happen here? Universal Health Care explains how it can. Clear and convincing, Universal Health Care shows that health care can be funded from the public purse without eliminating choice and without bankrupting government, and it proves that a public, single-payer system can deliver high quality care at much less cost to many more people than one based on market forces.

Pat Armstrong is Director of the School of Canadian Studies, and Hugh Armstrong teaches in the School of Social Work, both at Carleton University in Ottawa. Together they are the authors of Wasting Away, The Double Ghetto, and other works.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This study will give pause to Americans who are hostile toward government-funded national health care, for readers are shown that such a program succeeds in Canada. The system is committed to five principles enacted in the Canada Health Act of 1984: the program is universal, portable, accessible, comprehensive and publicly administered. The authors (Pat Armstrong is director of the School of Canadian Studies at Carlton Univ. in Ottawa, Canada; Hugh Armstrong teaches social work at the same school; Fegan is a medical instructor at the Univ. of Illinois) have done prodigious research, and although they are boring writers, their book could serve as a position paper for U.S. advocates of universal government-funded medical care. The study tracks the genesis of Canada's system going back to 1947, then explains funding (tax revenues), administration (a single payer, the government) and one-tier delivery (rich and poor use the same hospitals and doctors). Many comparison statistics are included vis-a-vis the U.S. and Canada: Canada has one practicing physician per every 448 people, the U.S. ratio is 1 to 432; Canada has one nursing home bed for every 113 persons, the U.S. one for every 523; life expectancy for Canadian women is 81.3 years, for U.S. women 79.2 years; etc. In chapters discussing "What the Problems Are" and "What the Problems are Not," the authors shore up their findings in a study that gives readers much to ponder.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Although healthcare reform failed in the United States, many people here continue to look with interest at our northern neighbor's system. The Armstrongs, two Canadian academics, team up with Fegan, an American doctor, to extol the virtues of Canada's universal health coverage. Pertinent anecdotes spice up the plentiful statistics documented in an extensive list of references. The text includes a history of the Canada Health Act and explanation of its benefits: accessibility, comprehensiveness, portability, and public administration cost savings. Negative aspects of the Canadian system such as the lack of drug coverage and lengthy waits for non-emergency treatment are acknowledged but given less attention. Overall, the Armstrongs present a readable and convincing case for universal healthcare. For a more objective though much less readable source, also consider How To Choose?: A Comparison of the U.S. and Canadian Health Care Systems (Baywood, 1998).?Dixie Jones, Louisiana State Univ, Medical Ctr. Lib., Shreveport
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: New Press, The (June 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1565845153
• ISBN-13: 978-1565845152
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #503,616 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars We still Have A Health Care Crisis!, April 12, 2010

By 

Charlie Foxtrot "Charlie Foxtrot" (The Mountains) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Universal Health Care: What the United States Can Learn from the Canadian Experience (Paperback)

This unemotional, factual book gives a good look at the Canadian health care system and shows, among many things, it is not "socialist," and that it delivers excellent care at much less cost. After reading this book (or any of several other excellent ones on the topic of health care reform) one will quickly appreciate that the recent US legislation will do little to solve the problem of delivering excellent health care at reasonable cost because it does little to get the costs under control. While anecdotes seldom provide solutions, sometimes they do identify the problem.

Some time ago (the day Reagan was shot; 1986?) my son broke his leg at Big White, a British Columbia ski area. He was attended by a physician on the hill; something I had never seen at any US area up to that time. After being splinted we transported him to the hospital since we had a station wagon and an ambulance would added nothing. There he was treated, re-x-rayed, bone set, and cast. Our cost: $125 even as nonresidents or citizens. The follow-up costs back in Seattle ran several times more although all that was required was cast removal in due course. Our insurance company, although it reimbursed us for that cost and the follow-up care refused to reimburse us $16.25 for crutches because the Canadian physician had not written a prescription even though they were obviously required considering the injury! The one fact that sticks out to mne is that Canadians spend about 5% of the health care dollar on paperwork and we spend 20-30% depending on whose figures you want to accept.

6 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars For US citizens, especially, February 1, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Universal Health Care: What the United States Can Learn from the Canadian Experience (Paperback)

Please ignore the review above.

A book such as this can assist you in obtaining unbiased information about how the US system CAN learn from what we have here.

Realistically, US capitalistic interests prevent honest, open discussion about health care reform in the states. This book provides the framework of the Canada Health Act, the legislation that guarantees health care for all Canadians.

In an age when 40 million Americans are without health coverage, books like these are important for their attempt to open the minds of others. By examining the principles of the CHA, answers can be found to questions addressing issues such as the lower life expectancy in the US and astronomical costs (6% more as a percentage of GDP than Canada) despite not covering so many people. You may even learn that our medical facilities and services rank among the best in the world, and are accessible without regard to one's ability to pay.

In brief, it can open your eyes to a world beyond Republicans, HMOs and greenbacks. You will come to realize and hopefully appreciate the ideas and values upon which the Canadian health care system was built.

Especially useful for people considering careers in health care, and the many Americans that apply to schools like McGill and U of T.

10 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Paradise in Canada?, September 29, 2000

By 

"frmokehee" (Alaska) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Universal Health Care: What the United States Can Learn from the Canadian Experience (Paperback)

What we can learn from the Canadian experience is best summarized in the following excerpt from Canada's McCleans weekly magazine March 1 1999:

"For Canadians in need of urgent medical care, the nation's hospitals all too often appear to be in a state of crisis. Horror stories abound--of patients turned away from hospitals, of cancelled surgeries, and cancer patients flown across the country or to the United States for treatment that cannot be delivered closer to home. In Toronto, a 45-year-old cystic fibrosis victim missed out on an urgently needed double lung transplant on Feb. 3; the operation had to be cancelled--and the donated lungs discarded -- because no bed or nursing crew could be found."

Articles abound in McCleans as well as the New York Times, Forbes, etc. in the US about Canada's failing system. Forbes reports Canadian doctors leaving Canada in droves. In fact, skilled people in general are leaving Canada's failed welfare state for the US.

To complete the socialist model perhaps in the authors next book Mr. Armstrong could discuss how the US revert to a command and control economy - you know, like the ones that were so successful in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.