Category: System

A Toronto Star journalist has been gunning to expose the highest billing doctors‘ incomes in Ontario for a few years.

She champions transparency. Voters have rights.

Doctors get paid with tax dollars; ergo, voters have a right to know.

But is this really about transparency?

Transparency cannot explain a hunt for the top 100 billers. Transparency might fuel a drive to go after all doctors, but not the 100.

Other than envy, or inciting envy to sell papers, what can explain the Toronto Star spending years on lawyers to expose the top 100?

Obsession with incomes fits with a particular political vision. It cares less about bad care than care being equally bad. Continue reading “Fees Drive Service, Incomes Drive Envy”

On Wed, Aug 8th, the gargantuan union, Unifor, brought in 100s of unionists from across Ontario and Manitoba to surround a medical clinic in Thunder Bay.

The union has been on strike since April 6th. But this was different.

Unifor strongmen set up fences around all the entrances. Police leave the new unionists alone.

Police want peace, not respect for the law. They refuse to escort doctors into the doctors’ medical offices.

After the fences, many docs worked on electronic medical records from home. They called patients. They used the Home Telehealth app to provide virtual visits. They innovated to provide care.

The courts issued an injunction to stop the illegal activity. Unifor defied it and went further.

On Friday, unionists filled door locks with glue, cut power lines and phone lines, and shut down WiFi.

Now docs have nothing. No way to check lab results. No way to inform patients about critical results. Continue reading “Unionists Break the Law, Put Patients at Risk”

I’m buried in research and thought I had my book mostly written. But something bugs me.

Authors want to stand out, to say something new. So why do so many Medicare authors say the same things about healthcare?

I dug through Canadian authors: Taylor, Decter, Naylor, Rachlis, Simpson, Marchildon, Picard, Fierlbeck and even Martin, Furlong, Gratzer, Doig, Vertesi and others.

Aside from the last three, no one tears apart Medicare except to say we aren’t doing enough:

We do not have a system. We have 13 separate systems!

We need more services, more accountability and more regulation!

Everyone supports the pillars of Medicare, but no one supports doctors. Continue reading “Medicare Authors Criticize Doctors, Pander to Everyone Else”