CLHIA report on health care policy : Rapport de l'ACCAP sur la politique en matière de soins de santé: pour un système de santé public de qualité, accessible et viable

Thus, in order to be comprehensive, the health care system should be guided by the following five principles: availability of essential health services across a range of disciplines, accessibility of health services for all Canadians, timely receipt of health services, high quality of health services provided, and affordability of health services. [...] The question of how best to deliver and pay for service and the implications of such choices lay at the heart of the debate. [...] Others maintain that any substantial change (such as, expanding the role of private insurance and private payment, or allowing physicians to work both within the public system and privately) will undermine publicly funded health care and the principles of the Canada Health Act.8 Current Private Funding Involvement At the present time, Canada’s health care system is conducted as a shared public-pri [...] In his February 2008 report to the Québec government on ways to stabilize health care budgets, the former Health Minister Claude Castonguay agreed with this approach, recommending that the money should “follow the patient”.19 As well, the Castonguay task force recommended the scope for private insurance should be expanded to include other services in addition to knee, hip and cataract surgery and [...] The CLHIA recommends that federal, provincial and territorial governments, in order to address health care provider shortages, consider means to expand the scope of practice for a variety of health care providers as well as means to integrate health care professionals trained abroad more effectively into the Canadian system.