Commentary
Canada does not have to choose between universal health care and health-care reform. What we cannot continue to choose is a system in which Canadians are promised universal care but increasingly cannot access it when they need it.
The principle behind medicare remains simple and worth defending: necessary medical care should be available according to need, not according to the size of your bank account. But defending universal health care does not mean defending a delivery system that is increasingly failing the people it was created to serve. Access delayed indefinitely is not meaningful access.
The numbers should concern every Canadian. Nearly six million adults still lack reliable access to a family doctor, nurse practitioner or primary-care team. The Canadian Institute for Health Information reported this summer that emergency department wait times have increased substantially from pre-pandemic levels, with overcrowding, staffing shortages, and insufficient hospital capacity contributing to the problem. CIHI has also reported that roughly one in five Canadians who visited an emergency department for a non-urgent condition did so because they could not access primary care elsewhere….