Roy Romanow, Ottawa's point man on health care, says medicare should be expanded to pay for services above and beyond those offered by hospitals and doctors to protect Canadians from rising medical bills.

CTV News Staff

Roy Romanow, Ottawa's point man on health care, says medicare should be expanded to pay for services above and beyond those offered by hospitals and doctors to protect Canadians from rising medical bills.

Romanow, who heads the royal commission on the future of health care, says medicare is more effective than the free-market approach used south of the border.

In an address prepared for the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard University, he said Canada's medicare system has lower administrative costs when compared to systems used in the private sector.

"Private insurance systems spend a lot of money on the extensive infrastructure required to deal with multiple insurance companies, assess risk, set premiums, design benefit packages, review claims and reimburse beneficiaries," he said.

Romanow said expanding medicare would increase funding requirements in the short term. But he said that over the long term such a move would create a more comprehensive and cost-effective system.

"If we don't lay the groundwork now, the private costs for these services will continue to grow with little restraint."

Romanow also warned that private-sector involvement in such areas as MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scans threatens medicare. Private clinics already offer the service on a fee basis in several provinces.

"This is a growing phenomenon and, in my view, potentially threatening," Romanow said .

"Why? Because it is a serious violation of a core value shared by Canadians: The notion that people should have equal access to care."

He said that patients that are tested sooner will also receive surgery and follow-up care sooner. Romanow said that violates a core principle of the Canadian system -- that medical need alone should determine who receives treatment first.

Romanow did not specify what additional services Ottawa should fund. However, currently medicare does not cover drugs and home care which increasingly account for a larger share of the health-care bill.

Romanow's comments may signal that he's preparing to recommend to Prime Minister Jean Chretien in his report to be released late next month, that Ottawa provide money for prescription drugs and home-care. An idea that would require an injection of billions of new dollars to health care to implement.

Under the present system Ottawa covers the cost of all drugs administered in hospitals but not those purchased outside.