REGINA: In a submission to the Medicare Review Commission, CTF Saskatchewan Director Richard Truscott calls for new ways to fund health care and control costs without hiking taxes.

"We need to think outside the box," says Truscott. "Our policy-makers must prescribe remedies now to deal with the demographic and technological challenges that threaten the sustainability of the health care system. We can't wait for these challenges to run us over."

Truscott says an aging population and other trends, like more expensive technologies, will force a change to how health care is funded. Actuarial reports have estimated that to fund current levels of health care in the future will require a 70% increase in federal and provincial personal income tax rates, or an increase in the GST to 35%.

"We can't afford pay-as-you go health care," says Truscott, who says the alternative is to invest money now to pay for future costs. "Just like people put away money for their retirement, governments have to start investing now to pay for health care's future."

Truscott warns that higher taxes to pay for health care would be counterproductive. "A strong health care system needs a strong economy to support it. We need more young gainfully employed people to Saskatchewan to support health care and other necessary social services. We need lower taxes, not higher taxes and premiums, to build this future."

Health care also needs a better way of allocating resources. Truscott recommends testing the proposals that have been made for health care allowances, health care debit cards, etc. These ideas are designed give people more control over their portion of public health care spending and encourage doctors to compete for patients.

"These innovative proposals preserve publicly funded health care but use patient choice to better allocate those public funds. Let's test them," says Truscott. "Right now, controlling costs means cutbacks by politicians and bureaucrats that are designed to meet budget cycles, not the needs of the system," says Truscott. "We need new ways to enlist patients to help control costs and better allocate public health care resources."

Truscott encourages the Medicare Review Commission and the government to act boldly to secure the future of Medicare. "To a country full of politicians who are afraid to even discuss health care, we must find the foresight, the flexibility, and the courage to show the way," he says. But he warns, "So thick is the mythology surrounding Medicare that honest and open discussion of its future has become the political equivalent of kryptonite. I fear that our inability to discuss its shortcomings will prevent us from making progress towards solutions."