Better Chronic Disease Management
Far too many people with chronic diseases end up in emergency rooms when other medical services would have better treated the problem. The good news is that there are ways to improve the situation – ways to deliver better health care while shortening the wait.
By improving and expanding the existing public Medicare system, people with chronic diseases will be better served – as will everyone else.
Greater Focus on Prevention, Promotion and Public Health Initiatives
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. For some reason, this wisdom has not been applied to our health care system. Far too many patients in hospitals or waiting in a doctor’s office are there with what are preventable illnesses.
Preventative measures will never remove the need for a more traditional health care system. Improving the overall health of Canadians through prevention, education and public health promotion will reduce the stress that currently exists.
Primary care reform and expansion
Your health needs are varied and a multi-faceted approach is best. The current system is organized as a series of individual service outlets operating independently of one another. We need to take these individual pieces of the system and organize them together.
Accurate information and evidence to make better decisions
When it comes to our health we need all of the professionals in the field to have the most complete and accurate information available to them. Electronic records would improve care, save lives, reduce hospital wait times and in the long run save money too.
More Public Investment in Dental Care and Oral Health Promotion
Good oral health is a critical factor in good overall health. But, our health care system doesn’t consider our mouths as part of a healthy body. And yet there is a great deal of medical evidence showing that good oral health is a vital component of disease prevention and overall health promotion. It’s time for the federal government to take leadership on oral healthcare.
A National Mental Health Strategy
Canada's mental health system must be brought into the mainstream of Medicare to provide better care for millions of Canadians and to help shorten the waiting time for care.
Inadequate access to mental health services means that more people must rely on emergency rooms and hospitals, often when another form of intervention would be better.
No Health Without Mental Health
A 14-page brief to the Mental Health Commission of Canada recommending broad change in four key areas: the public health care system, health human resources, community-based social services, and the criminal justice system.
Better Nursing Home Care for the Elderly
Long-Term Care must be integrated into the Canada Health Act to ensure it is a medically necessary service available to every citizen, regardless of income.
This is an essential step in the evolution of Canada’s public Medicare system.
Create a National Pharmacare Program
Publicly funded and accountable, a national pharmacare program would go a long way towards improving our medicare system.
Such a program would ensure equal access to prescription drugs for all
Canada's Medicare System: Building on the Legacy!
Dignity Denied: Long-Term Care and Canada's Elderly
Canadians cherish our universal, public health care system. It provides access to quality life-long health care services for all Canadians, regardless of wealth, social status or other barriers. For the most part, this is true. Sadly, though, there is a hole in Canada’s health care system. For tens of thousands of Canada’s seniors today – and many thousands more in the years ahead – the universality of our health care system ends at the doors of nursing home facilities. Some of these facilities are excellent, serving as a beacon for the care of seniors. Sadly, they seem to be the exception. As a result of government neglect and corporate profit-taking, the needs of many seniors have been swept under the carpet, abandoned and ignored by health care commissions, politicians and policy makers alike. This report details the ongoing crisis in nursing home care across the country and it proposes a series of bold and sweeping reforms to ensure our elderly get the care the need and deserve.
Create a National Home Care Program
Increased home care services can help ease the wait time problem for people needing an acute hospital bed. For some patients, being provided home care will mean that a hospital bed is made available for someone who needs it.
Medicare must be expanded to cover all home care treatments and services.
Pandemic Influenza Planning Checklist
Canadian Pandemic Planning
An influenza pandemic is inevitable. Will we be ready to handle it when it comes? Yes, is the answer in a new National Union background paper on Pandemic Planning. But, the paper also argues that Canada could and should be doing more. It sets out what we really need to know about the threats a pandemic presents and what Canada is doing to prepare for one. It also recommends actions that workers and their unions should take to make us all as prepared as possible.
More Health Professionals
A principal cause of long wait times in our public health care system is plain enough: a shortage of health professionals. Our demand for health care services keeps increasing. But our health professional workforce is static or shrinking. We simply need to train, recruit, and retain more health professionals. This leaflet highlights some important steps Canada can and must take to build an adequate supply of health professionals.
Short Wait Times
Our Medicare is the triumph of values and economics. It provides all Canadians with equal access to care on the basis of need, not wealth or privilege or status. Health spending in Canada is on par with most countries in the Western world, it is substantially lower than in the United Sates, and we devote a smaller portion of our GDP to health care today than we did over a decade ago. And our health outcomes are among the best in the world. Over the last 40 years, our Medicare has served us well. But there is room for improvement. Wait times for certain diagnostic, surgical and treatment services are way too long. Coming to grips with how to fix long wait times must be our top priority. This leaflet outlines 10 steps to ensure all Canadians get more and better care - faster.
More for Less: A National Pharmacare Strategy
Prescription drug costs and the number of medical errors related to prescription drugs in Canada are surging. Canada now spends about $18-billion annually on prescription drugs. And an estimated 12,000 deaths annually are attributed to the misuse and over-prescription of drugs in Canada. With a new federal government in place, the National Union is working in coalition with a large number of social groups and other labour unions to renew calls for a national public pharmacare program. Read this comprehensive policy paper to find out why universal first-dollar coverage for cost-effective, safe prescription drugs will save money and lives.
Private Care is No Cure
Wait times are the biggest political and policy issue facing Canada's public health care system. The opponents of public health care have used the legitimate public concern about delays in the system to peddle ill-advised policies such as for-profit delivery and private insurance. But the evidence unequivocally demonstrates that for-profit clinics will not reduce wait times in the public system, will drive-up costs, and almost always provide inferior quality services. This pamphlet explains the top six reasons why private care is no cure for what ails our public health care system.
It's Time for a National Home Care System
Canada's home care workers are delivering a wider range of services and treatments to more people than ever before. It is better socially, it is better for the patient's mental and spiritual health; and it makes good economic sense. Unfortunately, Canada's home care system is a patchwork of programs and services. What is needed is a coherent national strategy that is publicly administered and proved with sufficient money and staff to offer the necessary home care services.
Home Care: We DO make house calls (updated March 2004)
Canada's home care workers bring their skill and compassion to help people in their own homes. Unfortunately, the workers who provide home care are often not treated with the respect or the support they deserve. The National Union and its Components are committed to achieving a national home care system that treats it's workers fairly and with dignity!
A People's Contract
The Trial That Didn't Kill Medicare
On June 9th, 2005, in a razor-thin four to three vote, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Quebec government's prohibition on private medical insurance violated the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms where there are unreasonable wait times for care in the public system. Unfortunately, any useful information about what the court ruling really means for the future of Canada's public Medicare system was swamped in a tidal wave of propaganda from the for-profit medical lobby. This leaflet peels away the misinformation and disinformation about the court ruling to show that while the ruling is a wake-up call for governments, reports of the death of our public Medicare system have been greatly exaggerated.
Presentation to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health on Prescription Drug Costs
In October 2003, National Union president, James Clancy, made a presentation to a parliamentary committee on health care urging the federal government to address the issue of soaring drug costs. Read this submission to learn about the union's collective bargaining experience as it relates to surging prescription drug costs, our recommendations for change, and how Canada can respond with intelligence and compassion to the full-blown HIV/AIDS pandemic in Africa.
Medicare Fact Sheets
1. We Can Afford It download PDF
2. Private Delivery download PDF
3. User Fees download PDF
4. Delisting download PDF
5. For-Profit Won't Deliver download PDF
6. Drug Abuse Inc. download PDF
7. Taking Care of Business download PDF
8. Not Without A Fight download PDF
9. It's all About Equality download PDF
Sickness Doesn't Discriminate
One of the shining glories of our Medicare is that the care is fair. There's no discrimination based on wealth, health, race, religion, political beliefs or any other particular personal characteristics, traits or preferences. But a fearsome shadow now haunts our theory and daily practice of public, never for profit, health care for all. It is cast by private, always for profit, health care. Private, for profit health care is, at its core, based on discrimination. It treats the rich better than the rest of us. It uses money to decide who gets care and how good that care is. But that's just the thin edge of the wedge. Once the idea of discrimination is allowed for one reason, it becomes acceptable for almost any reason. This pamphlet proves this claim is true by providing a statistical picture of the way things are in the US system.
Canada's Medicare: It's all About Equality for Canadians with Disabilities
There is no better way for Canadian governments to promote equality, independent living and sustainable livelihoods for Canadians with disabilities than by protecting and expanding public Medicare. As governments diminish public Medicare they diminish their commitment to equality for all. No one knows this better than Canadians with disabilities. Thus the effort to respect, restore and expand public Medicare is, for Canadians with disabilities, not just about better medical care. It is also an effort to respect, restore and expand the equality of Canadians with disabilities. This background research paper explains how expanding public Medicare to include home care, support services, and prescription drugs would go a long way in promoting greater equality, better health outcomes, and independence for Canadians with disabilities.
Not Without A Fight
It's Sunday, July 1, 1962. In Saskatchewan, the CCF Government of Woodrow Lloyd makes history. It activates the Medical Health Care Act. It is a great day for Medicare, a great day for democracy, a great day for Canadians! This leaflet provides all the information you need to know about what we had to do to get Medicare and what we will have to do to keep it.
Taking Care of Business
Canada's Medicare is truly the triumph of values and economics. This leaflet explains why our Medicare makes it cheaper to run a business in Canada. Read this leaflet and discover the competitive advantages that our Medicare provides to businesses operating in Canada.
The Awful Truth About For-Profit Health Care
What's the difference between leeches and private for-profit health care? Not much. Leeches once were supposed to be the magic cure-all. They weren't. Now private for-profit health is supposed to be the magic. It isn't. Read this leaflet and find out why it isn't.
Mugged at the Drug Store
The multinational brand name drug makers are money junkies. They are all hooked on easy profits. This leaflet explains how big drug corporations abuse the sick, Medicare and the law to get their fix. It also offers three prescriptions to cure the curse of high drug costs.
Death May be Your Cure: How Health Insurance Companies Make Sure Your Health Can't be Harmful to Their Wealth
This leaflet exposes how private for-profit health insurance companies make sure your health can't be harmful to their wealth.
Submission to the Romanow Commission
International Case Studies of For-Profit Health Care Reform: Learning From Others' Mistakes
Politicians think tanks and the mainstream media often extol the benefits that the private sector and "market mechanisms" will supposedly introduce to the health care system. But what are the real facts and figures? Have market-oriented health care options been tried elsewhere and, if so, how successful have they been? This document provides an overview of the impact of introducing market mechanisms into the health care systems of other countries.
3 Big Fat Lies About Canada's Medicare
This pamphlet exposes seven myths that have been promoted by those campaigning for a private health care system.
