University of Michigan Flint economics and finance professor Mark Perry flags the following story in the Windsor Star:
Between April 2007 and April of this year, 55 Ontario patients have been referred to Roswell Park in Buffalo, NY to receive IL-2 treatments for stage IV melanoma, and four patients were sent to the Harper University Hospital and the Karmanos Cancer Center in Detroit, Michigan.
Dr. Perry comments:
The story is about a 30-year old Canadian man with melanoma who lives in Windsor, Ontario and has been approved for IL-2 treatments in the U.S. by Canadian authorities, but is being forced to drive four hours to Buffalo instead of across the Detroit River for treatment in Detroit. Reason? Cost savings.
Is this really the kind of government-run health care system we want in the U.S.? Where will we send cancer patients if we adopt a Canadian-style health care system?