Dr. Danielle Martin explains the virtues of our single-payer
system before a U.S. Senate subcommittee.
It was a bit like watching a tennis match,
with every serve returned with calm precision as Women's College Hospital
family physician Dr. Danielle Martin took on North Carolina Republican Sen.
Richard Burr at a Senate subcommittee hearing in Washington March 12.
Danielle Martin’s cellphone has been vibrating non-stop since
Tuesday morning.
That’s because the Toronto doctor’s name has been trending on
social media ever since her bold appearance before a U.S. Senate subcommittee
where, according to the Los Angeles Times, she set
one “smug” senator straight about the myths and misunderstandings surrounding
Canada’s heath system.
“A taste of senate politics for a Canadian doc — makes the House
of Commons look tame,” Martin tweeted herself, immediately after her
appearance.
The vice-president of Women’s College Hospital and former chair of Canadian Doctors for Medicare was one of a
handful of international experts to testify about their respective single-payer
health systems before the subcommittee on primary health and aging.
Martin, 38, gave as good
as she got when it came to tough questioning from Republican anti-Obamacare
senator Richard Burr.
Burr: “Why are doctors exiting the public system in Canada?”
Martin: “Thank you for your question, Senator. If I didn’t express
myself in a way to make myself understood, I apologize. There are no doctors
exiting the public system in Canada. In fact, we see a net influx of physicians
from the United States….”
Burr: “What do you say to an elected official who goes to Florida
and not the Canadian system to have a heart valve replaced?” (He was referring
to former Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams’ eyebrow-raising decision in 2010
to go south of the border for heart surgery.)
Martin: “It’s actually interesting, because in fact the people who
are the pioneers of that particular surgery, which Premier Williams had, and
have the best health outcomes in the world for that surgery, are in Toronto, at
the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre, just down the street from where I work… .”
Burr: “On average, how many Canadian patients on a waiting list
die each year? Do you know?
Martin: “I don’t sir, but I know that there are 45,000 in America
who die waiting because they don’t have insurance at all.”
She is receiving widespread praise for her performance: “Dr.
Danielle Martin just became Canada’s newest hero,” boasted the Huffington Post.
“She more than held her own. She did very well,” remarked Bernie Sanders, an
independent senator from Vermont who invited her two weeks ago to testify
before the subcommittee, which he chairs.
“My staff did an exhaustive look for who could best reflect the
values of the Canadian health-care system. She has a very stellar background,
both as an academic and as a physician,” he said in a phone interview from
Washington.
Martin is an assistant professor in the departments of family and
community medicine and health policy, management and evaluation at the
University of Toronto.
In addition to holding an M.D., she has a master’s degree in
public policy. She is a recipient of the Canadian Medical Association Award for
Young Leaders and was a member of the Health Council of Canada.
Martin said she was honoured to have the opportunity to address
the senators, but felt a little sheepish that there seemed to be more interest
in what she had to say than the other invited panelists, including Taiwan’s
former health minister.
Sanders
said her address was enlightening, adding that the U.S. has much to learn from
Canada’s health system: “We learned that its strength is in its universality
and cost-effectiveness, which Canada does a much better job of than we do.”
It was a bit like watching a tennis match, with every serve
returned with calm precision as Women’s College Hospital family physicianDr. Danielle Martin took on
North Carolina Republican Sen. Richard Burr at a Senate subcommittee hearing in
Washington March 12.
Burr, an opponent of Obamacare asked
Martin, vice-president of medical affairs and health system solutions at
Women’s College, “how many Canadian patients on a waiting list die each year?”
“I don’t know, sir,” she replied quickly. “But I know that there
are 45,000 in America who die waiting because they don’t have insurance at
all.”
Burr also asked about the number of doctors leaving the public
system. Martin responded that “there are no doctors exiting the public system
in Canada and in fact we see a net influx of physicians from the United States
into the Canadian system.”
And to his observations about the benefits of a two-tier system on
wait times, Martin responded: “We believe that when you try to address wait
times, you should do it in a way that benefits everyone, not just people who
can afford to pay.”
And so it went. Cross-border shopping for health care, quality of
care, wait times, everything Burr tossed at Martin, she sent back with
restrained ease.
Even Sally Pipes of the Pacific Research Institute in San
Francisco, who was also testifying, seemed impressed with how Canucks handle
themselves, including around the issue of wait times.
“The
Canadian people are very, very nice people. They are not impatient like
Americans.”
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