Death Panels..Canadian Style

[FJO]

Let me tell you, as a Canadian, about health care in Canada.

First, keep in mind, that Canada is a confederation of 10 provinces, similar to the confederation of 50 states in the United States. If any American tells me that the health care in all 50 of the United States is equal, I will tell them that they are liars, and I can base that on the fact that, while a Canadian citizen, I lived in the States for six years, at an apartment paid for by the company I worked for, with all my meals paid for and an automobile provided. I did that while I was a self-educated computer programmer, who developed a system that was unique and made our company less prone to be victims of fraud.

For that I earned the invitation to work in our company's head office with all the perks, described above.

While I was commuting to and working in the States, I had a chronic pain in my shoulder, for which there seemed to be no cure, except for prescription of (after naproxen, viox, arthrotec and celebrex)
morphine, which I had to take around the clock. In Canada, I had to wait six months to see a specialist only to be told that "I don't do shoulders, only hips and knees". Another five months got me to see a specialist who managed to squeeze me in for a 45 minute orthroscopic surgery in three months.

That was all in the province of Ontario, which is Canada's largest province in population.

When I moved to Manitoba, in order to be closer to our grandchildren, I found a surprising and delightful difference. No long waits for anything. Almost instantaneous response in the most up-to-date and modern facilities. Doctors who care and make an effort to honor and keep the time of appointments.

Even socialized medicine has its advantages.

While working in the States, I explored the possibility of getting rid of the pain. I would have had to wait no more than two weeks for the same surgery that I finally got in Ontario in about a year and a half.

 

[Interpol]

Pulling the plug WOULD be murder and here's my reasoning; when we decide to pull the plug on a family member who will not recover, we think we're doing the humane thing, but we're actually starving the person to death.

We should be euthanizing the comatose person, which puts them to sleep the same way you do when you have an operation, and then another drug stops the heart. It's so much more humane than "pulling the plug".

 

[Dragonlady]

And, if you are a bit older than the guidelines accept, treatment will be withheld - you have an obligation to die...

Not true. My mother had triple by-pass surgery at the age of 77. My husband's grandmother had cancer surgery and radiation at the age of 91. No one has treatment withheld.

 

[Lumpy 1]

Just sayin..

Wait times for medical treatment getting longer: Fraser Institute report | CTV News

 

[Ame®icano]

He is unresponsive, and practically dead as it is. Pulling the plug will not be murder.

In certain religions you can't pull the plug. You just can't do it. It's wrong.

If someone has been lying in a bed for three YEARS, it is safe to say that there is no hope. Keeping them alive only prolongs the agony of the family, and it prolongs the natural death of someone who should have passed away years before.

My family discussed this issue years ago. We've decided that if something like this happened to us, we'd spend three months on life support, and if, after that time, we hadn't begun to make a recovery, we'd pull the plug.

Lets tone it down a little.

You're saying pull the plug if no improvement after 3 years. I understand your position.

Now, lets say someone has migraine for 3 years and there is no hope migraine will stop. Would you "pull the plug" on migraine medications? Just don't say it's different...

 

[francoHFW]

So after 3 years, a family refuses to unplug, and can stop it in the court- and that's the horrible death panel...just another way the hater dupes are out of their tiny minds....we'll have special hospitals for the plugged up to spend until theY finally die of old age- BRILLIANT. LOL

 

[Ame®icano]

After sticking all our youth with our debt and Dem-O-Care..reasonably, you gotta wonder.

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Last week Canada’s Supreme Court ruled that doctors could not unilaterally ignore a Toronto family’s decision to keep their near-dead husband and father on life support. In the same breath, however, the court also confirmed that, under the laws of Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, a group of government-appointed adjudicators could yet overrule the family’s choice. That tribunal, not the family or the doctors, has the ultimate power to pull the plug.

In other words: Canada has death panels.

Canada has death panels, and that?s a good thing.

He is practically dead. He cannot be saved. Keeping him alive drains the healthcare system - the taxpayers. If they want to keep him alive, pay for his treatment. If not, pull the plug.

Exactly. Canada has nationalized medical care. The government, the taxpayer, is paying for this man's treatment. To keep him alive when there is no hope of recovery drains money out of the health care system. The family's desire to keep him on life support is an emotional decision; the doctor's decision to take him off life support is a logical, practical decision. Also, as has been noted, this is the same in the US, essentially. If a family insists on keeping someone with no chance of recovery on life support, the hospital can take the case to court and have the court decide. Unless a family is paying for all the expenses, they should not have the right to prolong life when there is no chance of recovery and force the taxpayer to foot the bill for their emotional decision and inability to let the patient die a natural death.

Cool explanation. Let's try it this way.

US has welfare laws. The government, the taxpayer, is paying for their existence. To keep paying them, when there is no hope they will ever try to live on their own drains money from the welfare system... figure out the rest on your own.

 

[Ame®icano]

After sticking all our youth with our debt and Dem-O-Care..reasonably, you gotta wonder.

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Last week Canada’s Supreme Court ruled that doctors could not unilaterally ignore a Toronto family’s decision to keep their near-dead husband and father on life support. In the same breath, however, the court also confirmed that, under the laws of Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, a group of government-appointed adjudicators could yet overrule the family’s choice. That tribunal, not the family or the doctors, has the ultimate power to pull the plug.

In other words: Canada has death panels.

Canada has death panels, and that?s a good thing.

The whole problem with this argument is that it has nothing to do with killing anyone. The patient is going to die; it's only a matter of when. Life support is the only thing keeping the patient alive and there is not going to be a change in the patient's condition. Eventually the patient will have to be taken off of life support and then will die. This is the type of shit we do in the US that costs billions of dollars per year. We extend people's lives for no reason at all. These are people who are not going to get better. They are only alive because a machine keeps them that way, and it costs everyone.

But, it's that big bad boogeyman, the DEATH PANEL that we must all fear.

We ALL going to die, it's only a matter of when. So lets just deny any help to anyone... cause it cost money to taxpayers.

You see, liberals are all for "helping middle class", but when it really comes to exactly that issue, they are first to change their mind and turn their blind eye.

 

[Ame®icano]

The man has the 'right' to live if he can choose to live - he can't. He's a vegetable.

Then it is up to his wife to decide as they have agreed.

Not the people, doctors, or the government

-Geaux

Yes it is up to the wife if she is paying. But it is not up to the wife to demand other people's money to satisfy her religious or other principles.

So, back to the States, why government demand other people's money to pay for someone's contraception?

 

[Ame®icano]

What happens when someone chooses not to be put to death and the panel decides they are not capable of making that decision? What happens when the panel decides the family and appointed decision maker is too emotionally involved to make that decision?

You have to question how much money they are costing the taxpayer to keep them alive, and is it worth it when they will never wake up?

If they are costing the taxpayer millions of dollars to keep them alive by artificial means, then the hospital - and even the State - should be able to petition the courts to either send the family a bill for expenses, or pull the plug.

Cool, let's then ask how much money cost taxpayers to keep all those people on welfare and is it worth to keep giving them money if they never intend to work... just sayin'.

 

[Ame®icano]

What happens when someone chooses not to be put to death and the panel decides they are not capable of making that decision? What happens when the panel decides the family and appointed decision maker is too emotionally involved to make that decision?

You have to question how much money they are costing the taxpayer to keep them alive, and is it worth it when they will never wake up?

If they are costing the taxpayer millions of dollars to keep them alive by artificial means, then the hospital - and even the State - should be able to petition the courts to either send the family a bill for expenses, or pull the plug.

The bottom line then is there is no "right" to health care. It is a boon, granted or withheld at the pleasure of the panel. The basis of that boon is how much the care will cost. As explained by the presidunce, obama, a 95 year old woman, fully conscious, functioning, living a life with daily enjoyments could be denied a pacemaker because it is too expensive. Give the woman a pill until she dies.

Every time medical care is dispensed under a government supported system, the panel will evaluate the cost of the treatment v. the benefit to the state. It might be someone in a persistent vegetative state today, but tomorrow it will be a woman who serves no purpose but to enjoy bingo and butterscotch pudding. At least according to obama, and that might be the only time he ever told the truth.

The purpose of government death panels is to turn the medical care system into a system more like a veterinarian. You take your cat to the vet. He tells you that your beloved cat is seriously ill and needs surgery of $5,000, with follow up care of perhaps $10,000 more. As the owner, you know your cat is old with not much life expectancy left at best. You elect to humanely euthanize him. Not because he could not make a full recovery and last another five years, but because five more years is not worth the cost. You are the owner. The cat is the pet. As a pet, the cat has no say over his own life nor any right to live beyond the pleasure of your decision, you hold all power of life an death. That's what national health care does. It turns us all into house pets with the government as owner. We become owned. We have as much say over personal decisions of life and death as any slave on the plantation when the master knows the slave has outlived his or her usefulness. As much value as any animal.

The government should really stop lying and calling it a right to health care. There is no RIGHT to health care. There is health care at the pleasure of the government.

Reply to red highlight...

At the same time, they wouldn't look to save any money to keep homosexual AIDS patient on cocktail drugs, because it fit their agenda. Why not to pull the plug there?

 

[Ame®icano]

If a person has terminal cancer, or any other terminal illness, why should public or private insurance pay for coverage beyone making him/her as comfortable in passing as possible? Or do I misunderstand?

My mother was told she was terminally cancerous and told her that chemo probably won't help. She elected to try it and hope for the best. She beat the odds and 11 years later is still here.

That is a tough one because sometimes, doctors can get it wrong - but rarely. 90% of the time, if you have terminal cancer, chemo won't help.
Your mother was the exception.

Cocktail drugs for AIDS wont cure you, so in your own words, why bother. Pull the plug, right?

 

[Noomi]

US has welfare laws. The government, the taxpayer, is paying for their existence. To keep paying them, when there is no hope they will ever try to live on their own drains money from the welfare system... figure out the rest on your own.

How do you know they won't get a job, or are you just assuming?

 

[Noomi]

My mother was told she was terminally cancerous and told her that chemo probably won't help. She elected to try it and hope for the best. She beat the odds and 11 years later is still here.

That is a tough one because sometimes, doctors can get it wrong - but rarely. 90% of the time, if you have terminal cancer, chemo won't help.
Your mother was the exception.

Cocktail drugs for AIDS wont cure you, so in your own words, why bother. Pull the plug, right?

Drugs for HIV won't prevent AIDS, but it does slow down the progression of the disease.

 

[Dragonlady]

Just sayin..

Wait times for medical treatment getting longer: Fraser Institute report | CTV News

The Fraser Institute is a radical right wing think tank that has as part of its agenda, the destruction of the Canada Health Act and the introduction of US style health care in Canada.

I have yet to read a single "study" they've put out that is statistically reliable. This is the Ontario Government website wait time page:

Wait Times - Ministry Programs - Public Information - MOHLTC

This is the reliable information.

 

[Ame®icano]

US has welfare laws. The government, the taxpayer, is paying for their existence. To keep paying them, when there is no hope they will ever try to live on their own drains money from the welfare system... figure out the rest on your own.

How do you know they won't get a job, or are you just assuming?

The same way you know that patient won't recover after 3 years.

 

[Ame®icano]

That is a tough one because sometimes, doctors can get it wrong - but rarely. 90% of the time, if you have terminal cancer, chemo won't help.
Your mother was the exception.

Cocktail drugs for AIDS wont cure you, so in your own words, why bother. Pull the plug, right?

Drugs for HIV won't prevent AIDS, but it does slow down the progression of the disease.

I wasn't talking about HIV.

 

[Luissa]

After sticking all our youth with our debt and Dem-O-Care..reasonably, you gotta wonder.

---------------------

Last week Canada’s Supreme Court ruled that doctors could not unilaterally ignore a Toronto family’s decision to keep their near-dead husband and father on life support. In the same breath, however, the court also confirmed that, under the laws of Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, a group of government-appointed adjudicators could yet overrule the family’s choice. That tribunal, not the family or the doctors, has the ultimate power to pull the plug.

In other words: Canada has death panels.

Canada has death panels, and that?s a good thing.

There is so much bullshit ignorance in that article, it's annoying.

Due your homework on the Canadian system, and what actually happens.

For one, the case they speak of is a prime example of why you should look it up.

 

[Lumpy 1]

Just sayin..

Wait times for medical treatment getting longer: Fraser Institute report | CTV News

The Fraser Institute is a radical right wing think tank that has as part of its agenda, the destruction of the Canada Health Act and the introduction of US style health care in Canada.

I have yet to read a single "study" they've put out that is statistically reliable. This is the Ontario Government website wait time page:

Wait Times - Ministry Programs - Public Information - MOHLTC

This is the reliable information.

Just wondering, what makes the "Fraser Institute" so radical right wing.

I get that you wholeheartedly trust your government for reliability, integrity and fairness, that's not the case in the United States.

 

[Lumpy 1]

After sticking all our youth with our debt and Dem-O-Care..reasonably, you gotta wonder.

---------------------

Last week Canada’s Supreme Court ruled that doctors could not unilaterally ignore a Toronto family’s decision to keep their near-dead husband and father on life support. In the same breath, however, the court also confirmed that, under the laws of Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, a group of government-appointed adjudicators could yet overrule the family’s choice. That tribunal, not the family or the doctors, has the ultimate power to pull the plug.

In other words: Canada has death panels.

Canada has death panels, and that?s a good thing.

There is so much bullshit ignorance in that article, it's annoying.

Due your homework on the Canadian system, and what actually happens.

For one, the case they speak of is a prime example of why you should look it up.

Oh, Shut Up....