Canadian Doctors for Medicare - deadline to sign pledge to support Canadian health care system (re: federal election)

Sample Email To Federal Candidates

Dear ,
I am writing to ask that you make a commitment to our health care system and sign the Canadian Doctors for Medicare Health Care Protection Pledge.

The pledge was emailed to you last week and simply asks you to offer your commitment to protect our health care system. That commitment involves:

 Sustaining the Canada Health Act with all its protections and all five principles now and after the 2014 Health Accord and enforce it across Canada.
 Continuing to fund health care through Federal transfer payments tied to compliance with the Canada Health Act.

Please confirm your commitment to our health care system by signing the pledge and sending it to Canadian Doctors for Medicare by April 29th, 2011.

Canadian Doctors for Medicare will be publishing a list of candidates who signed, and who did not sign the pledge before voting day.

If you haven’t received the pledge, you can contact Canadian Doctors for Medicare at info@canadiandoctorsformedicare.ca or download a pledge form from their website www.canadiandoctorsformedicare.ca.
Sincerely,

....................................................

2011 Federal Candidates (separated by province/territory)
Alberta: AB_Federal_Candidates.pdf
British Columbia: BC_Federal_Candidates.pdf
Manitoba: MB_Federal_Candidates.pdf
New Brunswick: NB_Federal_Candidates.pdf
Newfoundland: NL_Federal_Candidates.pdf
Northwest Territories: NWT_Federal_Candidates.pdf
Nova Scotia: NS_Federal_Candidates.pdf
Nunavut: NU_Federal_Candidates.pdf
Prince Edward Island: PE_Federal_Candidates.pdf
Saskatchewan: SK_Federal_Candidates.pdf
Yukon: YK_Federal_Candidates.pdf

Medical News: SGO: Ovarian Ca Patients Shortchanged by Medicare - in Meeting Coverage, SGO from MedPage Today

Action Points  

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• Note that this study was published as an abstract and presented at a conference. These data and conclusions should be considered to be preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal.
• Explain that an analysis of NCI and Medicare databases found that less than 40% of patients over age 65 with advanced ovarian cancer received care that measures up to national standards.
• Note that this study found demographic factors -- including race, marital status, geographic location, and socioeconomic status -- affected whether patients over 65 received optimal treatment.

Canadian Doctors for Medicare - Defending (Canadian) Medicare

Canadian Doctors for Medicare advocates for the maintenance and improvement of Canada's universal, single-payer health care system. ...

Canadian Doctors for Medicare | False Alarm on Health Care

"....the tiresome insistence on using faulty logic to justify alarmist views on health care.

Three pieces of real data ought to put this debate to rest.

First, increases in the cost of health care are not a result of our public system. They are common to systems around the world, all facing new and expensive technologies and ever-increasing demand.

Second, Canada's medicare system is actually quite reasonably priced. It is the increasing cost of drugs, which are mostly privately funded, that is increasing health-care costs.

Third, user fees and privatization would increase health-care costs overall by downloading them from governments onto citizens. Furthermore, experience with user fees demonstrates that they cause people to delay necessary care, which leads to more profound and expensive illnesses when care is eventually sought....."cont'd