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Orono Weekly limes, Wednesday, November 22, 2000 - 7 The Peter Principle by Peter Jaworski Private health care is 'not a sin,' says our effable leader Jean Chretien, when asked about whether or not his family family ever uses private health care. Joe Clark, fatherly grin and all, admits to having used privately run health care though he adds, quickly and seriously, that it is 'non-profit' 'non-profit' and therefore not as dirty or disgusting as those 'for- profit' hospitals which, presumably, presumably, would overrun the country with disease so as to make an extra nickel. Politicians are not the only ones amongst us making use of private clinics and private health care providers. Business folks do, all the time. So do the affluent and the relatively affluent or those hit with a particularly vicious malady which requires the most expert of hands and equipment. And yes, just in case you're curious, I am talking talking about Canadians. You see, just south of us there is a huge mass of land with people and businesses and roads and customs and farms. And hospitals too, private private ones at that. This land is not lore as you may imagine given that, in the mindsof all the 'intellectuals' here, 'everyone' knows that public health care is the best and brightest and is the only way we can get together, hold hands, and sing 'kumbayah,' (and who wouldn't want that?!). This land is called the United States. In order to get access to the private hospitals down south, however, you have to fill out certain paperwork, make arrangements at work, plan someplace f@r your family to stay (if they choose to come with you), and do a number of things over and above what you would do were you simply simply planning to travel there for pleasure. And if the trouble trouble is immediate, you have to have some sort of access to airplane transportation without without any of the typical procedures procedures that would inundate the ■ ordinary traveller. Politicians have this access, so do business business folks, and so do the affluent. affluent. We say, and' it has much political clout, 'why should the rich or the politicians get better health care than the rest of us?' And we imagine that here in Canada, that 'prob- care in the U.S., except in certain, certain, dispersed, instances, are the middle class (i.e. the vast majority of us). We don't have the requisite political channels, nor do we have a couple grand sitting in a Vault somewhere to afford not only the medical treatment but the travel and expense of having to get it in another country. Don't be sold on all that political hoopla about American health care costing an 'arm and a leg' and being inaccessible to its own citizens. citizens. This is just not true. The vast majority of middle class Americans, even if uninsured, can afford their system of medicine just fine. With the notable exception of the NDP, most political parties parties at least have the integrity to avoid those 'talking points' even if they slip up eveiy once in a while. What does this mean? Well, it means that were we to stop all the rigmarole about public health care being the epitome of 'social justice' and 'well-being,' we, too, could have access to better health care here in Canada. It's not the rich that are being excluded from getting better health care, they're probably planning their next check up in Alabama right now. It's the middle class that is. lém' is non-existent since we have, more or less, a public health care system. A more lucid analysis of the subject would reveal that this is not the case, that the folks mentioned mentioned do have access to better better health care and, though they have to pay more, they are making use of that system all the time. We haven't stopped the 'problem,' nor have we made it a little better, we have just exasperated it. The only people people that are incapable of jumping through all of the hoops to get at private health J Pedicures/Manicures Waxing Nail Extensions Ear Candlir^g Eyelash Tinting . ESTHETIC STUDIO Air Brushing • Electronic Muscle Stimulate (EMS) Paraffin Wax Brigitte 1 Brown ■ I I I I | 15% DISCOUNT with coupon | I Certificates | Available I 171 Mill Street, Orono, ON LOB 1M0 • (905) 983*8169 ^