Comparison Of Healthcare System Between Canada And The United States Of America

1. Your country has a universal health coverage system. However, are there services that are not covered, or only partly covered, under that system? If so, what are they? Are there any individuals or groups who are not covered under your system? Please specify the individuals and groups. How does this compare with the U.S. health care system?

2. Who contributes the money to pay for covered health services (services under the national health plan)? What percentages of total national health care expenditures, or contributions to the health funds (whichever numbers are most readily available to you) come from which sources? Where do the monies reside: central public funds, local public funds, employer funds, or a combination of funds? How does this compare with the U.S. health care system?

3. Who pays out the money to providers, i.e. which institutions? Would you consider this to be a single payer system of payment, or not? Explain your conclusion. How does this compare with the US health system?

4. Is there any private health insurance in your country? Who buys it and for what reason? What percentages of total national health expenditures are associated with private insurance?
How does this compare with the U.S. health care system?

5. How will the ACA make the U.S. health care system more similar or dissimilar to that of your comparison country? Be specific about which provisions of the ACA you are referring to, and cite your sources.

Coverage and Quality of Care

In Canada, healthcare system is currently being assessed and the quality care process are being provided to the countrymen through federal system. Universal healthcare system in Canada is effective and covers almost every section of the society so that the fundamental right if each human can be preserved (Baldwin, 2011). However, there are several lacks in the coverage system and few sections of healthcare system are not even covered under the public health scheme. Such as for example, drug and home healthcare service are still not covered under the public healthcare system. Further, there are sections in the healthcare system that allows outside the country coverage only after receiving the approval from the local and central province. Further, due to excessive demand of quality healthcare in Canada the painting time to receive quality healthcare is one of the limiting factor for the healthcare in Canada and this situation is also not covered under the universal healthcare coverage scheme (Brown, 2003).

While comparing these shortcomings of Canadian healthcare system with that of the united States of America, it should be mentioned that the process of arranging travel insurance or healthcare insurance for non-residential Americans is much more easier than Canada as do not seek permission from the health ministry to approve the healthcare needs of travelers or nonresidential (Faria, 2012). Further, as the healthcare related competition has decreased the costs in USA, admission of patients in hospitals for quality healthcare has become easier in lower prices. However, on the aspect of moral and cultural foundation of universal coverage, the United States of America lacks behind Canada and there are a huge number of people who are still not covered under any healthcare insurance and the amount is more than 40 million. Therefore, Canada is still improving its healthcare system and has started adopting new management systems so that the healthcare system can be modified (Deber, 2003).

Healthcare or Medicare system in Canada is funded by public or government or single payer healthcare system of Canada. This country does not have a single healthcare system instead it is composed of 13 provinces and territorial healthcare insurance plans which aims to provide the Canadian population, residents and some specific non-residents with medical coverage through universal healthcare coverage (Martin et al., 2018). The publicly financed healthcare is estimated to contribute by 11.1% in GDP and according to this stat more than 70% of total healthcare costs are covered through public or governmental healthcare sources. The primary source of healthcare funding in Canada are the general and territorial funding process the public organization provides cash funding to the provinces and uses Canada health transfer that determines more than 24% of total province and regions healthcare costs. Through this public healthcare service, service, out pocket spacing on healthcare and cost-sharing and safety nets are covered. These monies are obtained from central government public funds, the local and province based funds, employers and their funds and from public and private combined funds (Martin et al., 2018).

Funding Mechanism for Healthcare

In case of Canada, the province and central government should agree to each-others terms so that the fund sharing arrangements can be done in compliance with each other. However in case of the United States of America, such funding process is replaced by the social insurance strategy and USA believes that funding process are should be applied on single payer basis so that rigidity in the process can be avoided. Further, without implementing Medicare or insurance coverage, implementation of cost cutting in healthcare system has increased the competition between the healthcare systems. Hence, the healthcare and Medicare system of Canada is much more effective and resolved that that of complex healthcare system of USA (Schneider & Squires, 2017).

In the Canadian healthcare system, funding for healthcare and Medicare are one of the important as according to the Healthcare related act of Canadian government, health insurance plans must to informed and provided to all the provinces so that the entire population can go through them and implement those plans to achieve secure and safe healthcare needs. Here the role of federal government of Canada is important as it helps to set and administrate the national principles for the entire system under the healthcare act of Canada (Arah et al., 2006). Furthermore, the federal government provides funding by cash to the entire provinces after collecting taxes further there are several public healthcare systems that provides funding related help to all the provinces irrespective of the size and capital present in those provinces. Therefore, each province had similar and equal amount of funding as the federal government believed in equalization payments of the resources. Further the federal government is also responsible for the maintenance of health related regulation and protection and for that it also regulates pharmaceutical products, food and medical devices, and observes disease surveillance and prevention to protect the populations right to attain quality healthcare.

As the rising healthcare related costs are one of the emerging issues the USA is facing currently, funding providers for healthcare or Medicare also had to suffer several issues in the entire system. The healthcare profession is more lucrative and single provider basis in USA, therefore maximum of the healthcare professionals are not covered or acquired through a public healthcare firm. Therefore, the healthcare system are not forced to join any healthcare or Medicare funding system. Therefore, the healthcare system is not inclusive of public and private healthcare system that cooperates each other for the growth and development of the healthcare service in each prospect. Hence, in this aspect Canadian healthcare system is again better than that of the USA healthcare system.

Comparison of Funding Mechanism of USA and Canada

There are several private organizations, that have invested in the healthcare insurance in Canada, such as sun life, Canada AXA health insurance and According to the Canadian healthcare related acts, the countrymen are allowed to purchase an supplementary healthcare coverage service that are not covered under their public healthcare scheme (Arah et al., 2006). However, those people who are not covered under any public health insurance, are not allowed to buy private healthcare insurance. As this is one of the crucial part of Canadian healthcare system, only private coverage for healthcare purpose are not allowed. Hence, in the Canadian healthcare system, people having public healthcare insurance plan can buy private healthcare insurance to complement their other complications. According to the Schneider & Squires, (2017), more the $4.3 billion USD are been used by the private healthcare facilities in Canada.

However, in USA, people can buy any of the healthcare coverage from the market, as due to competition, there are companies that are providing maximum health coverage at minimum costs. Most of the healthcare related insurances covers employees and workers in USA and therefore as low as $89 dollar healthcare insurance plan is available in USA. In this case Canada still manages the system properly, as those healthcare private insurances companies are covered under public healthcare coverage, therefore, in any case the government is paying the payable amount (Brown, 2003).

There are number of evidences, provided in the previous sections that provide an ideal universal healthcare model as compared to the USA healthcare system. According to Arah et al., (2006), the Canadian healthcare system is focused to cover the entire population, and few of the non-residents through healthcare coverage system, whereas more than 40 million population of USA are still not covered under any healthcare system (Schneider & Squires, 2017). The Affordable care Act or Obama care tries to comply with the healthcare system of Canada to come extent. However there are five differences that still can be identified such as ACA still not covers universal users as we’ll as it does not inclusive of single payer. Further, it does not provide equal access to everyone and depending on Socio-economic status, Medicare is provided and the system is not a national health insurance or mandatory. Therefore, these are the differences in provision of ACA and Canadian Medicare system (Faria, 2012).

References

Arah, O. A., Westert, G. P., Hurst, J., & Klazinga, N. S. (2006). A conceptual framework for the OECD health care quality indicators project. International Journal for Quality in Health Care, 18(suppl_1), 5-13.

Baldwin, S. (2011). HEALTHCARE SYSTEMS AROUND THE WORLD. Global Health (1937-514X), 4(1).

Brown, L. D. (2003). Comparing health systems in four countries: lessons for the United States. American Journal of Public Health, 93(1), 52-56.

Deber, R. B. (2003). Health care reform: Lessons from Canada. American Journal of Public Health, 93(1), 20-24.

Faria, M. A. (2012). ObamaCare: Another step toward corporate socialized medicine in the US. Surgical neurology international, 3.

Martin, D., Miller, A. P., Quesnel-Vallée, A., Caron, N. R., Vissandjée, B., & Marchildon, G. P. (2018). Canada's universal health-care system: achieving its potential. The Lancet.

Schneider, E. C., & Squires, D. (2017). From last to first—could the US health care system become the best in the world?. New England Journal of Medicine, 377(10), 901-904.