Getting surgery in the U.S. is a sign something is wrong

Here’s a clear sign that our healthcare system has failed us.

A man hoped to get the province to pay for back surgery he had in the United States during the pandemic. He was unsuccessful.

Our story from earlier this week talked about the chronic pain this man suffered while waiting for spinal surgery at Grand River Hospital in April 2021. After 10 months, he couldn’t stand it any more, so he went to Florida for the MRI and to New York City for the surgery in February 2022. From his point of view, he had no choice.

And how many of us have done the same, or at least thought about it, while desperately trying to navigate our own path through Canada’s broken health-care system?

Can surgery really be described as “elective” when not having it puts you in constant pain, unable to work or to live your life?

This man waited for many agonizing months before finally making his costly move.

His request to have the Ontario Health Insurance Plan pay for it was denied, because the province only reimburses treatment that is required immediately and for a condition that is acute, unexpected and arose outside of Canada. The man appealed that decision, but lost the appeal.

“As you know, the pandemic wreaked havoc on the medical system in Ontario and … left me with no choice but to seek treatment/ options in the U.S.A.,” he told the appeal board.

But he wasn’t wrong to act in his own best interests after the medical system ignored his needs.

Canadians’ trust that our healthcare system would always protect us was torn to shreds in the harsh reality of the pandemic.

The delays in diagnosis and treatment that happened because of the pandemic are tragic — and heartbreaking.

The Ontario Medical Association estimates 21 million health-care services were backlogged, including doctor visits, diagnostic tests and surgeries like the one this man waited for and never received.

There are 1,960 estimated undiagnosed malignant melanomas, 46,000 undiagnosed squamous cell carcinomas (a form of skin cancer) and uncounted numbers of mental health and addiction problems.

Some delays are understandable. But the pandemic is long gone, and we seem to have fallen even further behind.

Instead of investing in health care to revive it, Premier Doug Ford has held back money that was meant to be spent on health care.

Earlier this year, Waterloo MPP Catherine Fife blamed Ford for underspending on health care and other essential services by $20 billion. That money is being held in contingency funds instead of being spent on services, she said.

Meanwhile, many of us have no family doctor and are barely able to access the system at all. By 2026, Kitchener and Waterloo will have 150,000 people without a family doctor, nearly twice as many as 79,000 now.

Our health-care system, which delivered excellent care to everyone, regardless of income, has always been Canadians’ pride and joy. But look at it now. It’s a mere shell of what it used to be.

Canadians’ trust that our health-care system would always protect us was torn to shreds in the harsh reality of the pandemic