Misplaced pride

How did Canada ever survive without Universal Healthcare?

A Leger poll published just in time for Canada Day informs us that the top reason to be proud of being Canadian is “universal healthcare.” Likewise the top reason for not being proud of being Canadian is “universal healthcare.”

Canada Day: Canadians’ Celebration Plans and Canadian Pride

So what was the impetus for Canadian politicians to take such a drastic step as to outlaw private healthcare insurance?

In Saskatchewan, where we gave birth to this sacred cow, there were protests orchestrated by labour unions and the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) led by the eugenicist

¹

Tommy Douglas.

While in Ontario, there was very little call for socialized medicine, and yet the Progressive Conservative government of the day enacted legislation that would eventually eliminate the free competitive market in the funding and provision of healthcare and lead the people down a path they didn’t ask to take.

Here is an article published in the Toronto Globe and Mail of 1963 which I found reprinted in The Daily News.

It is quite evident from the article that the source of Canada’s healthcare misery lay not with the people directly, except in so far as they were responsible for electing their leaders, but with their political betters and the ideologues in the press. These privileged few used their power and influence to rid Canada of a free market in the one sector where it matters most…healthcare.

I leave you with this marvelously restored collection of videos of Canada during a time before “universal healthcare.” A time of obvious abject poverty, misery, and deprivation. A time when Canadians obviously had very little of which to be proud.

1. https://macsphere.mcmaster.ca/handle/11375/7736