Posted on 06/09/2005 7:18:46 AM PDT by youngtory
Supreme Court strikes down Que. medicare laws CTV.ca News Staff
The Supreme Court of Canada has decided to strike down Quebec's prohibition of using private insurance for services covered under medicare
Four of the court's seven judges decided that denying patients the right to seek private health care insurance violates the Quebec Charter of Rights.
But the court was divided on whether the Canadian Charter of Rights has been violated, so it's unclear how the ruling will affect the rest of provinces.
The case stemmed from a Quebec patients who argued that his rights were violated by long waiting lists under the current medicare system.
George Zeliotis brought his fight to the Supreme Court along with Dr. Jacques Chaoulli, a Quebec physician who says he's fed up with the current system.
They asked the court to overturn portions of the Quebec Health Insurance Act and Quebec Hospital Insurance Act that prohibit payments for medically necessary services.
Zeliotis spent more than a year in pain, waiting for a hip replacement in 1997. He finally got a new hip but says he should have had the right to pay earlier for the surgery himself, even though it's illegal to pay for health services covered by medicare.
He and Chaoulli argued that spending months waiting for surgery amounts to a violation of their constitutional rights to life, liberty and security of the person.
With Thursday's ruling, it appears the Supreme Court agreed with their argument.
The court could have ruled in one of three ways: allow the existing law to stand, strike it down, or require governments to provide a so-called "care guarantee" to patients on how long they have to wait for treatment in the public system.
Phillippe Trudel, who's representing Zeliotis, told Canada AM ahead of the ruling that he didn't believe that a decision in his client's favour would lead to the destruction of the public health system.
"It's important to point out that my client is in favour of a very strong public system. But what he wants is the option to go outside the public system if the waiting times are too long."
Good for them.
Looks like Canada's Supreme Court sometimes makes more sense than ours...
The begnning of the end for siocialized medicine in this communist "Utopia"!! Damn time!
Actually, the SCOC is worse than yours. It's just this once that they finally made a right decision.
youngtory wrote:
Actually, the SCOC is worse than yours. It's just this once that they finally made a right decision.
-- Are they, Dare i say? Stabbing in the dark? :P
"But what he wants is the option to go outside the public system if the waiting times are too long."
amazing statement....socialized medicine/government run health care isn't to blame it's those dang waiting times! waiting times that are too long for care that is crappy.
under Hilary's plan going outside the "public system" would have been illegal punishable with $100,000 fines for the doctors and mandatory jail time.
Just looked at your profile, youngtory.
Glad to see that not all of our Canadian neighbors are socialists...
...do you think Conservatives have a chance to gain a majority in Canada anytime soon?
I'm not sure about that. Only if our leader finally promotes Conservative policies instead of listening to CINOs in our party. Of course I used to be a liberal a social conservative one but I finally saw the light just a few days before my 18th birthday.
..and became a Conservative.
HMMMM.....maybe we need to do something similar here....take Medicare to the Supreme Court for not allowing individuals to pursue care "outside of the socialized system"......
Look at it this way: 3 supreme judges on that court, think that citizens have no right to secure the services of a physician and pay for those services.
To me it's worrisome that 3 of them actually think that and the people have not run them out of town long ago.
Posted on 11/20/2003 3:15:45 AM EST by Lancey Howard
November 19, 2003 -- DAN Aykroyd is no fan of the bureaucratic bungling and cut-rate care of socialized medicine. "One place you don't want to get sick is Quebec," the Canadian actor advised us after a screening of Denys Arcand's "The Barbarian Invasions." "It's all socialized. Believe me, you don't want to go to a hospital there.
From this I gather that the plaintiff, George Zeliotis, is your typical socialist scumbag, a hypocrite, and he is actually no diffferent than an American Democrat. Socialism is good for the ignorant masses but not for me.
The fact that the SCOC had to strike down that crazy law, instead of the citizens of Quebec running the legislators who voted for it out of town, is still a troubling sign.
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This is interesting. The federal court has the power to enforce provincial constitutions?
I'm Canadian and had cataract surgery performed in Canada on a user-pay basis. I was in bad shape and was facing a year wait, presumably with a white cane and listening to the radio. There are services that can be procured for money in Canada. Don't let the socialists tell you it is all socialized...it isn't. I have blood work, physicals, MRI's all done on a pay basis in Canada. It is under the surface, but they won't admit it, nor advertize it. Just thought you'd all like to know this.
Zeliotis spent more than a year in pain, waiting for a hip replacement in 1997. He finally got a new hip but says he should have had the right to pay earlier for the surgery himself, even though it's illegal to pay for health services covered by medicare.
He and Chaoulli argued that spending months waiting for surgery amounts to a violation of their constitutional rights to life, liberty and security of the person.
---
He's right. Government monopoly on healthcare is always negative and tyranical.
http://www.neoperspectives.com/governmenthealth.htm
This ruling reinforces the division of powers, as health care is a provincial power. This could impact all provinces and the Canada Health Act. We may see a small role back of Socialism in this country.
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