Should medicine be ageist? A young trainee doctor recently proposed to me that it should. Healthcare is overstretched, she argued. “We can’t do everything for everyone, so why spend money on old people, who have little chance of benefit?”
Addressing the specific needs of Canada’s frail older adults would improve health outcomes and quality of life ― and reduce health costs
As the population ages, there is a growing belief that a tsunami of elderly patients will bankrupt the healthcare system, but evidence shows that this is a misconception.
As the population ages, experts say that the current institutional model of care needs to change to better support aging patients.
The Fraser Institute has argued recently that the federal government has failed to make a convincing case for Canada Pension Plan (CPP) expansion.
When the previous Health Accord expired in 2014, the Harper government unilaterally established a new funding model for federal health transfer payments to the provinces and territories based on an equal per capita basis.
Amazingly, eight of ten provincial finance ministers and the federal government have agreed to a modest increase in the Canada Pension Plan (CPP).
Last week the C.D. Howe Institute released a short study just in time for the finance ministers’ meeting — rolling out the tired, old argument that as people age, they do not need as much money to live as when they were younger. If only retirement were so easy.
Funding home care and long-term care is fast becoming the main challenge of our outdated medicare system — a system developed in the mid-twentieth century for a young population that mostly required acute care from hospitals and physicians.
We know that Canada’s population is aging. Among the many statistics that have been reported is how in 2015, the proportion of Canadian seniors surpassed that of youth under 15 for the first time. The gap will continue to widen over the next 20 years.
