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Bc Health

Health Care Silences B.C. Politicians

CP | Keven Drews, The Canadian Press | Posted 04.23.2013 | Canada British Columbia

VANCOUVER - Nobody should be surprised the province's politicians are skirting the issue of public-private health care during the election campaign, s...

'We Have Third-World Response Times Here'

CP | Cara McKenna, The Canadian Press | Posted 04.07.2013 | Canada British Columbia

VANCOUVER - Jackie Inyallie didn't have to die, her family says, in fact they add the 24-year-old woman's injuries should have been considered "non-li...

Money For Making Dying More Comfortable

CP | Tamsyn Burgmann, The Canadian Press | Posted 03.25.2013 | Canada British Columbia

VANCOUVER - If grief wasn't enough on learning his mother was dying of pancreatic cancer, there was more heartache for Stephen Roberts over his Mom's ...

$100,000 Offer For B.C. Doctors To Do This

CP | The Canadian Press | Posted 05.13.2013 | Canada British Columbia

VICTORIA - The B.C. Medical Association and the provincial government are teaming up to offer a big carrot to doctors to get them to practice in sever...

$324-Million Contract Not Working: A-G

CP | Camille Bains, The Canadian Press | Posted 04.30.2013 | Canada British Columbia

VANCOUVER - The B.C. government's decision to outsource administration of the Medical Services Plan and PharmaCare to a U.S.-based company has failed ...

B.C. Family Doctors Just Phone Call Away

Posted 02.22.2013 | Canada British Columbia

Patients in B.C. will soon be able to consult their family doctors by phone in a new program announced Friday by the provincial health ministry and th...

Penticton Hospital In Critical Condition

CP | The Canadian Press | Posted 04.08.2013 | Canada British Columbia

PENTICTON, - Doctors in Penticton, B.C., say the city's 62-year-old hospital is in critical condition and badly needs an upgrade.A group of 120 doctor...

B.C. Health Spending Slammed

CP | Dirk Meissner, The Canadian Press | Posted 03.19.2013 | Canada British Columbia

VICTORIA - British Columbia politicians have long touted their plans to make the province a model for healthy living and disease prevention, but a new...

B.C. Health Premiums Go Up

CBC | Posted 02.26.2013 | Canada British Columbia

For the fourth year in a row, the B.C. government is hiking Medical Services Premiums in January, but that's not the only way taxpayers will be handin...

B.C. Nurses, Government Make A Deal

CP | The Canadian Press | Posted 11.26.2012 | Canada British Columbia

VICTORIA - British Columbia's nurses have reached a tentative agreement with the provincial government that includes a small wage increase.Health Mini...

Doctors Join Fight For Private Health Care

CP | James Keller, The Canadian Press | Posted 11.19.2012 | Canada British Columbia

VANCOUVER - A group of B.C. anesthesiologists is asking to join a constitutional challenge of the province's ban on private health care, but they insi...

What Hasn't Changed Since I Was B.C. Health Minister

Rafe Mair | Posted 10.23.2012 | Canada British Columbia
Rafe Mair

Back in ancient times I was health minister in B.C. Much has changed. No one had heard of AIDS in 1979-80. Organ transplants were rare. MRIs were just gleams in inventors' eyes. One thing has however remained the same -- the debate over private medicine. In those days doctors were demanding the right of "balance billing," a euphemism for padding their bills. Now the doctors are mad at Vancouver's Dr. Brian Day for operating his own form of balance billing by running a clinic outside the Medical Services Plan. At this writing, Day is challenging the government to go to court and get an injunction against his clinic.