Health Reform Hub Issues

Issues :: International

Doctor Drain Turns to Gain: Physicians Move North
Tom Blackwell

National Post, 9/9/10

For years, an exodus of doctors to the United States helped fuel Canada’s growing shortage of medical staff, and gave emotional ammunition to opponents of Canadian-style health-care reform in the States. But medical recruiters and migration statistics suggest a surprising new trend has emerged over the past few years: a net movement of physicians from the United States to Canada. Read more...

Most Canadians Fear for Health System: Report Card
CTV Globe Media, 8/23/10

Most Canadians are concerned about the future of health care in this country, finds a new report card from the Canadian Medical Association. The survey found 80 per cent of Canadians worry that the quality of health care will decline in the next two to three years. They also fear the strain of aging baby boomers will be too much for the system to handle. Another three-quarters of people are worried they won't be offered the same level of health coverage that they once did as baby boomers start to retire. Read more...

Chinese Hospitals Are Battlegrounds of Discontent
Sharon LaFraniere

The New York Times, 8/11/10

Forget the calls by many Chinese patients for more honest, better-qualified doctors. What this city’s 27 public hospitals really needed, officials decided last month, was police officers. And not just at the entrance, but as deputy administrators. The goal: to keep disgruntled patients and their relatives from attacking the doctors. The decision was quickly reversed after Chinese health experts assailed it, arguing that the police were public servants, not doctors’ personal bodyguards. But officials in this northeastern industrial hub of nearly eight million people had a point. Chinese hospitals are dangerous places to work. In 2006, the last year the Health Ministry published statistics on hospital violence, attacks by patients or their relatives injured more than 5,500 medical workers. Read more...

Millions Spent on Doctor 'Gagging Orders' by NHS, Investigation Finds
Nigel Morris

The Independent, 8/2/10

Hospital doctors who quit their jobs are being routinely forced to sign "gagging orders" despite legislation designed to protect NHS whistleblowers, it is revealed today. Millions of pounds of taxpayers' money are being spent on contracts that deter doctors from speaking out about incompetence and mistakes in patient care. Nearly 90 per cent of severance agreements hammered out between NHS trusts and departing doctors contain confidentiality clauses. Read more...

Leviathan's Drug Problem
John R. Graham

Pacific Research Institute, 07/27/10



This study concludes that allowing American patients to access medicines that have already been approved in Europe would increase regulatory competition, enable more patient choice, and potentially save the lives of those suffering life-threatening illnesses and who currently have no treatment options. Read more...

Britain Plans to Decentralize Health Care
Sarah Lyall

New York Times, 07/24/10

Even as the new coalition government said it would make enormous cuts in the public sector, it initially promised to leave health care alone...it has done the opposite, proposing what would be the most radical reorganization of the National Health Service, as the system is called, since its inception in 1948. Read more...

The Drawbacks of Dutch-Style Health Care Rules: Lessons for Americans
Ryan Lynch and Eline Altenburg-van
den Broek

Heritage Foundation, 07/21/10

...But the Dutch [universal insurance mandates] have not caused individual consumers to seek value, and the “managed competition” has led to a less competitive market. Read more...

Consultants worried about supplies at London NHS trust
BBC, 07/19/10

Essential medical supplies have been lacking at one of London's NHS trusts while too many operations are being cancelled, senior clinicians have said. Read more...

For heart surgery, head for the border?
Marketplace, 07/19/10

A few medical tourism groups want to bring more American patients to Mexican hospitals for more than cheap prescriptions and dental work. They're promoting top notch care for cheaper price tag than what the patient would get in the U.S. Read more...

U.K. Will Revamp Its Health Service
Jeanne Whalen

Wall Street Journal, 07/13/10

The UK's new coalition government, grappling with weak public finances and rising health-care costs, announced an overhaul of the state-funded health system that it said would put more power in the hands of doctors and save as much as $30 billion by 2014. Read more...