The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
The nation's health care system will collapse within six years if the federal government doesn't step up to the plate with more funding, Premier Gary Doer has boldly predicted. Speaking at the NDP convention in Winnipeg last weekend, Doer called on Ottawa to foot half the bill for the nation's health care system, up from the approximately 16 per cent it currently funds. Failure to do so will result in the collapse of the health care system as we know it by 2010, he said. Doer kept details of his prediction to a minimum, saying he believes Ottawa will increase health care spending before his pessimistic prediction can come to fruition. Meanwhile, another devastating health care prognostication came this week in the form of a report by the Conferences Board of Canada, a respected think-tank. The report concluded that the health care system is not sustainable in its current form and requires more than $5 billion a year in additional funding just to maintain the existing services. "Health care in Canada needs a new vision, one focused on making Canada's population the healthiest in the world," lead author Glen Roberts told The Canadian Press.
