England & Canada question

[DarntheCat]

I, having lived in the most (Advanced) Socialist country I know of, Germany, and some of the worst. I can say that IMHO Sociallized medicine is a good thing. There are positives and negatives to everything, to say that the average person will receive care the same as a Congressman or Senator is ridiculous in the extreme, however, not one time did I see an Emergency Room Administrator ask for Insurance Paperwork. Imeadiate care was the priority, even there you could seek out a Private Physician if you were disatisfied with the level of care that you were receiving from the Subsidized Health Care Provider. The down side was that the quality of care was not as high as I am used to, but it did seem the more serious the illness or injury the better the care.

[Louie and me]

My husband had a heart attack at age 45, followed by quadruple bypass surgery. At age 52 he required both hips be replaced and at age 58 and again at 61 he required angioplasti with stents because of continuing CAD. He is also diabetic. We in Ontario Canada are covered by the Ontario Health Insurance Plan and all of these procedures were covered by the plan with no cost to us. We are required to pay for drugs however fortunately we have an extended health plan from my former work that covers 80% of the cost and now that I am over 65, OHIP covers all the cost for my drugs also. I cannot imagine what our life would have been like without OHIP but I suspect my husband would not have survived.
There are indeed sometimes wait times for elective surgeries (we have never experienced any) but I have never heard of anyone having to wait for life saving or emergency surgery.