It’s hardly news that Canadians have come to see their single-payer universal health care system as a part of the national identity. So when news broke of a Canadian campaigning against Obamacare by comparing it negatively to Canadian health care, it brought out a lot of strong emotions.
Shona Holmes of Waterdown, Ont., made the news three years ago when she spoke out against the U.S. Affordable Care Act with a story of being unable to get life-saving treatment for a brain condition in Canada. Now she’s back, starring in an anti-Obama ad from Americans for Prosperity, and making the same claim about Canadian health care.
Critics of Holmes point to news reports that Holmes suffered from a benign pituitary cyst that was hardly the “brain tumor” her supporters had alleged.
HuffPost blogger Graham Milne suggested Holmes may actually be the exception that proves the rule.
“It's telling indeed that Shona Holmes would be dragged out again three years after her initial appearance on the scene. The Kochs probably couldn't find anyone else,” he wrote, referring to the billionaire oil-baron brothers who fund Americans for Prosperity.
Here at HuffPost Canada, readers responded by telling their own stories about Canadian health care — many of them glowing endorsements of a health care system readers felt was unfairly portrayed in Holmes’ ad.
If there was something like a consensus to be had, it’s that the Canadian system can be painfully slow at times, but when a life is in danger, it springs into action — a view recently expressed by Jonathan Kay at the National Post.
Of course not everyone agreed that Canada’s health care system is superior to the U.S., and Holmes found her share of supporters as well.
”I'd rather go to my grave in the U.S. in debt, than die on the waiting lists here in Canada,” commenter MsSylv wrote.
And commenter LibertarianBoy, whose handle leaves little room for doubt as to where he stands on government-run health care, simply said this of Holmes: “God bless her.”
Check out some of the stories HuffPost readers shared about their experiences with Canadian health care.