Hot tub chatter

While recently seeking resuscitation for my tired muscles at my complex's hot tub, I got to talking with Los Angeles transplants from Toronto, Ontario.  Hot tub banter is of course a favorite past time of mine, and being that PM508 has made health care an important issue on my radar, I got to talking with my neighbors about their health care experiences in both countries.

They expressed their sentiments very clearly:  if you can afford health care in the United States, it is bar-none the best they have experienced.  They went on to say that on the whole, Canada offers tremendous care on the aggregate and to EVERYONE, but that wait times are often horrendous, even laughable.  One of the young man's grandfather waited in vain for a heart transplant that never came.  

A contrasting personal story: My grandfather happened to be a dear friend of the famed heart surgeon, Dr. DeBakey.  When he needed a new heart, his friendship with DeBakey proved to be beneficial, as he some how moved up a number of spots on the transplant list.  He was, at the time, the oldest heart transplant recipient on record (age 74).  There is no way that he would have received a heart without having the connection that he did, and in a system run entirely by a single payer.  

So these stories illustrate a catch-22, and if we reform the current system, we need to weigh the good with the bad, which of course is easier said than done.