Why make a deal? A dollar is a dollar is a dollar. If a dollar is spent by an individual or if it is spent by a corporation or if it is spent by a government agency, or if it is spent by the WCB or ICBC it is still a dollar spent and removed from the pool of available money.

Remove the profit making motive from health care and fund the system properly. It is significantly cheaper to do it that way than to have profit-making corporations provide services, if the US experience is anything to go by.

In the US about 16% of the GNP is spent on health care. In BC and Canada in general, about 9% is spent. Most of the access problems for things of this nature could be resolved if BC would increase its funding to about 9.5% or 10% of the GPP. That would still be significantly less than the US because of the lack of profit taking and well within the Province's ability to pay.

RE: The comment made by Mr Mair about the overutilization of MRI is erroneous and reflects a profound ignorance.

One of the results of our current governments reduction in funding has been the huge increase in homelessness and addiction problems and increased stress on the disabled and seniors. These are but four examples of how the shortsighted funding cuts have been used to increase pressure on the healthcare system. It is becoming ever more apparent that this is a diliberate stratagy to increase demand for services which allows for the governments to claim public healthcare is unsustainable and thus must be privatized. The Supreme Court has said that if governments can not provide promissed service in a timely fashion, patients will be at liberty to go outside the system. What a perfect decision to enhance the deliberate increase in pressure to the health system we have seen which the government then uses to scream this does not work so,we must privatize health care. We are not blind and educated people are aware of how the governments are manipulating the people so they can provide fat contracts to their freinds. I'll say it again; wake up people and stop acting like sheep!

Well glow, give us some light and tell us where Raif is wrong.

Sorry Rafe for the wrong handle.

REALIST:..."One of the results of our current governments reduction in funding..."

That doesn't sound very realistic. The NDP decade had line-ups that were even longer and I remember instances of people dying in ambulances waiting to get into an Emergency. That in spite of the government borrowing 1.7 Billion dollars per annum from the banking corporations and adding a grand total of 17 billion dollars to the debt of the province in ten years.

Am I to assume that the NDP was working as hard as it possibly could to fatten the balance sheets of its friends, i.e. the corporate lending institutions?

I stubbed my toe today and I am blaming the excruciating pain on Mr. Gordon Campbell and the Liberals.

I know what a mess the british system became when they went 2 tier.you saw the surgeon your options were and is,pay and it will take 2 weeks.stay on the free system and it will take 2 years.Same surgeon same hospital.When you dont have acountry worth living in.health care is only for the rich

"...stay on the free system and it will take 2 years."

I suppose the only ethical and moral solution is to have the "free" system only - and everybody has to wait 2 years, no matter what the personal circumstances are?

(Our system by the way is NOT free - it is supported by medical plan premiums and extensive government funding, most if which comes from the taxpayers, i.e. we are paying for it).

Or, one could do the other "only ethical and moral solution", and increase funding to reduce wait times to a reasonable level. See my previous post above.