Private service, public cost: Canadians confront rising user fees

 Health care cuts mean pay-per-care

 Internet U

 Like candy from a baby

 Costs spiral upwards

 Dismantling services, increasing poverty

 Privatized TransCanada highway robbery

 Privately-run rec centre hikes user fees

 Toll road paved with frustration

 Open and shut: the case for public investment in public services...

"Surreptitious de-listing or de-insurance of services by provincial governments; private clinics operating both in and out of provincial plans for ‘medically necessary services’ (and their medical practitioners keeping hospital privileges and having it both ways); treating GPs or specialists directing their patients to private labs and clinics for regular procedures at the full out-of-pocket cost; hospitals charging partial costs for exams because these might not be ‘medically necessary’ (wanting an MRI is not like choosing to have a hair colouring!) — these are all erosions of Medicare. People start losing all sense of their entitlements to health care."

"[A] significant shift of the burden of costs from the system onto individual patients relates to the drugs needed following day surgery in hospital. All the drugs patients used to receive ‘free’ in hospital they now have to pay for because they are at home for their recovery. I suspect that such ‘savings’ by hospitals on the backs of patients amount to a substantial sum of money. If, technically speaking, this practice may not be a legal breach of the [Canada Health] Act, it is clearly contrary to its intent and principles."

Monique Bégin, former Federal Health Minister and professor emeritus at the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Health Sciences, speaking at the Canadian Health Economics Research Association 8th Annual Conference. Begin was the main architect of the 1984 Canada Health Act.

Internet U

A company billing itself as the world’s first private Internet university has declared itself "open for business" in Fredericton, New Brunswick.

Unexus University, owned by private management training company Learnsoft Corp., will charge $25,000 for a two year executive MBA program, with the first course starting in January 2000.

The private venture got $600,000 from the Human Resources Development Canada jobs fund and the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency.

These funds are supposed to support job creation in the region. How Unexus will do this is unclear, given it plans to operate offices across Canada, the U.S. and Asia.

At present, Unexus does not have degree-granting status, however the corporation reports that the provincial government is considering a new law governing private universities in the spring of 2000, and will apply for accreditation under the new legislation.