{"id":10731,"date":"2011-08-17T12:28:54","date_gmt":"2011-08-17T16:28:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=10731"},"modified":"2011-08-17T12:02:30","modified_gmt":"2011-08-17T16:02:30","slug":"ontario-enables-a-snitch-line-in-the-fight-against-private-health-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2011\/08\/17\/ontario-enables-a-snitch-line-in-the-fight-against-private-health-care\/","title":{"rendered":"Ontario enables a &#8220;snitch line&#8221; in the fight against private health care"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Ontario government is fighting back against even the hint of privatization of health services in the province by, among other things, setting up a new <a href=\"http:\/\/news.nationalpost.com\/2011\/08\/17\/ontario%E2%80%99s-cure-for-medicare-snitching\/\" target=\"_blank\">snitch line<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s no doubt in my mind that people are trying to get around (the law)\u2026. I think it\u2019s really important that we all protect our universal health-care system,\u201d the Health Minister said in an interview. \u201cIt\u2019s just important that we are ever-vigilant.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Critics, however, call the initiative a politically motivated waste of money that could be better spent on improving actual medical services. In the lead-up to this fall\u2019s provincial election, the Liberal government seems anxious to portray itself as a steadfast defender of public health care.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHow is this going to improve patient care for anybody?\u201d Brett Skinner, president and health-care analyst at the conservative Fraser Institute think-tank, asked about the snitch line. \u201cIt\u2019s not helping patients get better access. In fact, it\u2019s designed to prevent patients from getting better access.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Canada Health Act generally forbids health-care providers from charging patients directly for services that are covered under medicare. Various private health services have cropped up in Quebec, B.C. and Alberta in recent years, however, with little interference by the federal government.<\/p>\n<p>The Ontario Liberals, on the other hand, have presented themselves as strenuous foes of private health care.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Ontario government is fighting back against even the hint of privatization of health services in the province by, among other things, setting up a new snitch line: \u201cThere\u2019s no doubt in my mind that people are trying to get around (the law)\u2026. I think it\u2019s really important that we all protect our universal health-care [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,66,53],"tags":[87,394,162],"class_list":["post-10731","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cancon","category-health-science","category-politics","tag-ontario","tag-privatization","tag-socializedmedicine"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-2N5","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10731"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10731\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10732,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10731\/revisions\/10732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}