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August 18, 2007
Giving Birth Under Socialized Medicine
Quadruplets in Canada? Bad idea:
A Canadian woman has given birth to extremely rare identical quadruplets.
The four girls were born at a US hospital because there was no space available at Canadian neonatal intensive care units. […]
Health officials said they checked every other neonatal intensive care unit in Canada but none had space.
This despite Canada's birthrate having fallen to historic lows.
Canadians are lucky now: they've got a free country right next door. After they get done paying for their "free" healthcare with exorbitant taxation, they have to cross the border and pay again down here, but at least they get healthcare. If Dems succeed in socializing medicine here too, the poor Canadians will have to drive all the way to Mexico.
Meanwhile in Britain, where bureauweenies nationalized healthcare long ago:
A young mother had to deliver her own baby in the lavatory of a flagship hospital because there were no trained midwives available.
Surveyor Catherine Brown had made the agonising decision to undergo a chemically-induced abortion after being told her 18-week pregnancy was risking her life.
But when the time came to give birth she was on an ear, nose and throat ward and had only her mother to help her through the ordeal. Her premature son Edward died in her arms minutes later.
The traumatised mother-of-one said: "I just howled and howled. I remember sitting there looking at him and thinking, 'What do I do next?'. I just sat there on the toilet looking at my dead baby.
"It was dreadful — a terrible nightmare. Then I started crying my eyes out and repeating, 'I'm sorry baby, I'm so sorry'. I still can't believe the hospital had no trained staff who could help me."
To compound Miss Brown's agony, the body of her child was almost discarded with hospital waste. […]
Her mother spoke of her fears that she was going to lose her daughter as well as her grandson, because she was bleeding so heavily.
"I was running around frantically trying to find gas and air for her and pleaded with nurses, who seemed very matter of fact, to assist," she said.
"The staff I did find told me they did not have the training to help. Catherine was left to deliver the baby alone with just me for help before cleaning herself up and going back to bed. It was horrific."
But their trauma was still not over. Miss Brown said staff almost took Edward's remains away for disposal despite her informing the hospital she wanted to hold a funeral.
Babies are only babies if liberal bureaucrats say they're babies. Otherwise, they're medical waste.
In related news, Elizabeth Edwards, wife of the Breck Girl, has announced that there is a "consensus" on the issue of socialized medicine, just like with global warming. She accused competing presidential candidates Shrillary and Osama Obama of not pushing for it aggressively enough.
On tips from V the K and Steve.
Posted by Van Helsing at August 18, 2007 11:11 AM
Comments
Wait! Wait! Michael Moore told me that health care in Canada is better. You're not suggesting that he was less than truthful, are you?
Posted by: Nigel at August 18, 2007 2:39 PM
To state that Canada has a improperly managed healthcare system because a family faced with a highly unusual birth could not find an available hospital in Calgary, a rapidly growing area, and had to find accomdations at a US hospital (they drove 325 miles to Great Falls Montana for the births because hospitals in Calgary were at capacity) is somewhat specious. As rapidly as Calgary is growing, many Canadians are having to travel from Calgary for medical care. A better observation might be that Canada has many areas suffering growing pains, just as the U.S. has.
A question of importance here also might be what the out of pocket costs to these people were, and how much do they pay for health insurance. Many US citizens would be broke for years paying the hospital bills, especially with HMO actions to minimize "losses"...
Don't mean to confuse anyone with facts.
Posted by: Shelby Christian at August 18, 2007 9:38 PM
"Health officials said they checked every other neonatal intensive care unit in Canada but none had space."
"The Jepps, a nurse and a respiratory technician were flown 500km (310 miles) to the Montana hospital, the closest in the US, where the quadruplets were born on Sunday."
Sorry, but those are the facts and I am neither confused nor amused. Canada could not handle the unusual birth with plenty of advanced notice. Canada paid to get to the nearest US hospital. Nearest US hospital. Isn't it passing strange that this highly unusual birth did not throw health care in a small regional US area for a loop?
I suppose Canadians think our streets are chock-a-block full of debtor homeless who lost it all to a predatory health care system. Michael Moore has to be very creative to come up with half a valid example of medical misfeasance.
Posted by: Heliotrope at August 19, 2007 8:25 AM
