A Canadian taxpayer all her life, Jean White never dreamed she would be draining her life savings to pay for her husband's health care.

Henry White has Alzheimer's and Jean can't look after him at home anymore. He is being moved from hospital into a long-term care facility.

The White's home province of New Brunswick says the family will have to foot the bill themselves -- close to $5000.00 per month.

"He can't walk. He can't go to the bathroom and he can't brush his teeth. He can't comb his hair," said White from her home in Bathurst, on the north shore of the province.

"I don't think it's right that we have to pay for his medical care."

New Brunswick did a means test on the Whites and determined they have enough life savings to pay themselves, instead of getting a subsidy.

The $5,000 bill will eat up almost all of their monthly income. Jean White will have to live off the savings, until much of the money is gone or until Henry dies -- whichever comes first.

"We have a two-tier health system now which is completely contradictory to the Health Act which says everyone should be eligible for the same health care," said Steven White, the couple's son.

"Someone who doesn't have the financial stability that my parents have are getting it free of charge and it's not fair. I'm not saying it should be free for us, but maybe it should be half the price or a quarter of the price."

If the Whites lived in Alberta, Ontario, or any other province for that matter, they would be charged less -- much less in some places.

New Brunswick is now charging up to four times more than other provinces for the same type of long term care. The province looks at almost all of a family's assets to determine if they can pay -- by far the toughest means test in the country. Only a few assets are exempt -- even the proceeds from the sale of the family home can be taken -- if and when it is sold.

"I think a Canadian in New Brunswick or Quebec or Ontario should be paying the same, no matter where they live," said their son. "That's the right and the privilege of a Canadian is to have health care paid for by the government."

The same dilemma could, theoretically, be faced by families in other provinces, too.

What most Canadians may not realize is that long term care is not actually covered by the Canada Health Act. The law simply doesn't spell out that medical services must be covered in those facilities, but it does say the provinces can charge patients for room and board. That, according to critics, leaves the door wide open for provinces to set prices as high as they like, and use some of the patients' fees to pay for their health care needs.

"This is totally against the principles of the Canada Health Act," said Bob Dobie, chairperson of the National Advisory Council on Aging (NACA). His organization is part of Health Canada, and its job is to advise the federal minister on health issues affecting Canada's seniors.

"We're certainly going to alert the minister to this," said Dobie. "It is totally unacceptable in this day and age. We hear of situations happening in the United States where people lose their fortunes and their life savings over health care and it's almost the same thing happening in New Brunswick."

Dobie said any province could decide to do the same and there's little Ottawa could do about it, under the existing law.

"Eventually there will have to be a debate on the Canada Health Act which would include long term care," he said. "I think we have to act on it very, very quickly."

CTV wanted to ask New Brunswick's premier, Bernard Lord, about this, when he was in Ottawa meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper last month. Lord's aide said he hadn't been briefed on the issue, so he wouldn't comment.

The new federal health minister, Tony Clement, told CTV it's not his place to step in.

"There's lots of decisions that provincial health ministries have to make based on what their constituents want, and what their patients need, and I've got to give them a little bit of room to make those decisions as long as it's not the provision of medically necessary services."

Henry White's long term care may not be an essential medical service under the law, but it certainly is to his wife Jean.

"I've given and given to the government and I've worked and worked hard," said White, close to tears. "I'm a Canadian too and I'm not getting what I deserve."

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