Death by a thousand cuts

United Conservative Party leader Jason Kenney called the Alberta budget a fiscal trainwreck. His argument remains focused on the fact that Premier Rachel Notley and Minister of Finance, Joe Ceci, failing to cut spending in the province to reduce the deficit. Kenney claims that he will reduce spending without making cuts in the if he wins the next election, but his political history points to a hidden agenda. When Kenney was a Cabinet Minister in Stephen Harper’s Conservative government, he supported Harper’s changes to the Health Transfer Payment formula. Changes that initially appeared as a 3% increase to spending, but ultimately increased the gap the funding required and the funding provided by the federal government to the provinces.

And last week, we sat back and watched as leaders in our own province of Alberta carried on through their poise misinforming the public. That’s alarming because these are the same politicians that travel the province preaching the importance of the rule of law and duty to the people. But, this kind of behaviour should come as a surprise.

But they are leaders, shouldn’t they care about what they are saying to us? Nope. What’s at play here is a little bit of hidden agenda. Politicians don’t have to care about what they say to you because no one is holding them accountable. The more confusion there is around a topic, then the less likely people are to follow along or question what that politician is saying because, whether want to admit it, humans are lazy at times.

Sorry, I wasn’t paying attention, did you say that they’re sneaking something behind our backs when we’re too busy staring at the phone in our hands? Yes. There is unwillingness amongst politicians to speak openly about their actual plan for healthcare in Canada. Probably due to the fear that there is literally no way anyone can stand in front of a crowd of voters and say, “hey, that hip replacement you wanted is going to cost $50,000.” And if you believe that politicians aren’t deliberate in misleading the public on their policies, then we as the public need to collectively pay more attention to what is happening.

By law, a province must be financially incapable of providing healthcare services in order for privatization to occur. The first step is cutting funding. Historically, health transfer payments were set on a per capita basis, but the Harper conservatives set their new formula on provincial GDP in 2011. This mean there was an increase in spending; however, transfers would ultimately decrease over time as GDPs shrank in certain provinces. As health transfer payments decrease over time the strain on the provinces to provide health care increase to the point where services must be outsourced to private-public partnerships or just privatized entirely.

Choking the healthcare system was exemplified in Alberta when laboratories and laundry services were privatized.¹ This went so far that some new hospitals built under the Progress Conservatives did not have laundry facilities within the hospitals. We can also see the increase privatization with imaging as MRI wait times increase because the provinces cannot afford to pay for new MRI machines. Each machine, plus a specially designed room required for the MRI machine costs upwards of $3 million Canadian. Cutting transfer payments and then expecting better performance in the healthcare system is not possible, it’s a way to justify privatization.

Shortening wait times for people in pain is a great way to sell the need for greater access to private facilities. Whether or not the government provides healthcare insurance, the cost to the public will increase. The average price of an MRI in a public facility is between $550 to $1,000.² In a private facility, that cost jumps to $750 to $2,450.³ The cost of a single MRI is, on average, more than most individuals paycheques. If the user has universal insurance, like Canadians have now, the cost still increases and in turn drives up premiums for taxpayers. It’s a lose-lose situation.

Let’s relive this discussion. MRIs in public or private facilities cost more than most individuals can afford. Private facilities that charge the government still increase the cost to the provinces which will worsen as health transfer payments decrease. There is an increasingly smaller number of individuals wealthy enough to pay out of pocket for these treatments. This situation can be applied to all aspects of the healthcare system, not just MRIs. In places like the United States where private healthcare is standard, people die saving their money for healthcare. This is a right-wing agenda-Conservatives don’t care about your health.

¹“AHS laundry privatization stopped after Sarah Hoffman … — CBC.ca.” 18 Aug. 2016, http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/alberta-health-minister-intervenes-in-laundry-services-1.3725703. Accessed 6 Apr. 2018.
² “Alberta can end MRI wait times — The Globe and Mail.” 15 Jan. 2015, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/we-can-end-mri-wait-times/article22482296/. Accessed 6 Apr. 2018.
³Ibid