Memphis Blues
Jul 10, 2017 · 1 min read

Yes, you’re certainly right. There are a number of countries which offer a certain amount of government-paid health cover.

From what I’ve read, the issue becomes supply versus demand. That is, the demand for these medical services is significantly higher than the available supply of hospitals and other infrastructure. As a result, the waiting lists for non-emergency care are significant and I’ve read numerous examples of people queuing for relatively routine surgery.

As a result, many of these countries include private cover which either provides separate infrastructure (e.g., private hospitals) or enables private cover subscribers to be assigned a higher priority for treatment.

I’m not aware of Canada’s policy, but I do know that the Australian government requires that all residents take out private health cover or pay a corresponding tax penalty. The reason for this is because the public hospitals simply couldn’t meet the demand.

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