Canada, land of medical delays

I know Canadians like to tout their health care, which is supposedly superior to the overly expensive care provided in the States. But one problem that has long dogged Canadian health care is a close cousin of the problem found in the UK: extremely long delays. In Canada, it sucks to be a cancer patient because you might not see a doctor for months, giving your cancer plenty of time to grow and metastasize. Now, I'm sure that Canucks who read these words will utter a lot of "Pfft" and other dismissive sounds, then tell me the whole situation's exaggerated. But I keep hearing about this problem, and it's not going away. 

Here's the latest headline.

Canadian Health Care Leaves Patients Frozen In Line

A new research paper from the Fraser Institute, a Canadian think tank, shows what happens when everyone within a country is trapped in a public health-insurance system.

This year, Canadian patients faced a median wait of 27.7 weeks for medically necessary treatment from a specialist after being referred by a general practitioner. That's over six months—the longest ever recorded. It's a slight increase from last year's median wait—and a 198% increase from the 9.3-week median wait that patients faced in 1993, the year that Fraser began tracking wait times.

Be sure to read the rest.