Recent announcements by Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams and federal NDP leader Jack Layton have brought health care to the forefront.
Williams was roundly criticized for his decision to seek cardiac care in the United States; Layton was praised for the up front way he talked about prostate cancer, the need to be checked, and his fighting spirit.
It was hoped that Williams's "run for the border" and his seeming disdain of the Canadian health care system, would be the catalyst for an honest discussion of the system, its funding, and its future.
That discussion is desperately needed, as health care consumes more and more of the federal and provincial budgets.
Not only that, but health care costs being pushed onto people's wallets are increasing too - from health insurance premiums, to costs not covered by insurance, to the need for more expensive equipment being funded by community donations.
There are problems with the system, and throwing money at them isn't always the solution. Ontario's disastrous e-health records debacle proved what unrestricted, unmonitored spending can achieve.
We have a "universal" health care system that still favours the rich and important, that's sometimes stifled under a bureaucracy that would rather cut services than let communities pay for them. In Ontario, the government and the LHINs control services, even if they don't provide funds - here in Centre Wellington, we had to wait for the LHIN and health ministry to approve a CT scanner for Groves hospital, even though the community would have to pay for it.
Unlike what we hear from the U.S., in Ontario you won't be left to die in the street if you get sick and don't have private health insurance - but the supposedly "universal" health care provided by the government has some alarming gaps.
While you won't have to swipe your credit card before getting treatment at an emergency room, you might find it's better to drive two hours to where you used to live to see your old family doctor, than add your name to a lengthy waiting list in your new community.
It's issues like these that make it imperative we start having serious discussions about the true nature of health care and how to improve it.
Unfortunately, that discussion will have to take place among politicians who will write legislation, which almost certainly dooms it to bog down in the pointless machinations of "party politics," partisan name-calling and finger-pointing, and blind lack of co-operation to anything "the other guys" present.