Canadian Medical Association President Jeff Turnbull tours Ottawa General Hospital on Dec. 13, 2010.DAVE CHAN
Canada's doctors say urgent action by the federal government is needed to avert a looming crisis in health care.
Jeff Turnbull, president of the Canadian Medical Association, will tell a sold-out crowd at the Empire Club in Toronto on Monday that Ottawa must create a Canada Health Care Action Plan, much like it created an Economic Action Plan to deal with the economic downturn.
Without leadership from the federal government, the CMA says the existing system of health care is not sustainable.
"As a federal election appears imminent, it will take political courage to take this issue on. But the national consultation we have initiated leaves no doubt that this is a priority for Canadians and ignoring health care during an election campaign would be foolhardy," Dr. Turnbull said in a release issued Monday before he was to deliver his speech.
The CMA says the aging population and the fact that the portion of provincial health budgets that is dedicated to health spending is approaching 50 per cent pose a double threat to Canada's public system.
A renegotiation of the 2004 Health Accord between Ottawa and the provinces that is set to expire in 2014 must begin now, the association says, but so far there has been little discussion taking place between the two levels of government.
Dr. Turnbull's speech comes as a new report by a group called Canadian Doctors for Medicare says widely repeated concerns about the sustainability of public health care are unsubstantiated.
The report, titled " Neat, Plausible and Wrong," argues that public-sector health-care spending has grown little over the last 30 years and shows no signs of rapid future growth.
It says core annual medicare costs have grown between 4 per cent and 5 per cent of GDP. And, while other public health care costs have grown at a slightly faster pace, the report says total public spending on health care has increased at an annual rate of between 5 per cent and 7 per cent for over three decades.
"It's a classic case of Chicken Little," Danielle Martin, the group's chair, said in a release issued Monday. "Once people started saying it, and put bit of spin on the numbers, no one stopped to question the facts."
Canadians are paying more and more for health care but it's the private sector that was primarily responsible for that growth, the group says citing large increases in the costs of pharmaceuticals.
The CMA, meanwhile, has launched what it says is a dialogue on health-care reform via a website, HealthCareTransformation.ca, and by holding a series of town-hall style meetings with Canadians
The aim is to determine whether Canadians believe they are getting good value for their health-care dollars, to establish what responsibilities they believe patients and their families must bear in regard to their health, and to find out whether they believe the Canada Health Act should be broadened to include such things as pharmacare and long-term care.