Health Insurance: Medicare and Policy Alternatives

health insurance: Right now, Canadian medicare is relatively exempt from NAFTA, as it was from the original 1989 Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement, according to Hamilton Spectator. I say relatively exempt because some analysts argue that any government effort to expand universal public health insurance into new areas where U.S. firms are involved could incur financial penalties under NAFTA. That point was made in two separate papers commissioned by the 2002 Romanow royal commission on the future of health care. Dont be surprised if he takes a swipe at medicare. One was written by a corporate trade lawyer, the other by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. A second exempts existing provincial and local arrangements like medicare that otherwise contravene NAFTA principles. But medicare as it is now gets a pass from NAFTA. One section of the free trade pact specifically exempts anything that is a social service for a public purpose from the overall NAFTA requirement that eligible foreigners be allowed to invest freely. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.