VANCOUVER—Virtually every other developed country with universal healthcare has moved to funding hospitals based on services provided to patients, while Canada remains one of only a handful of countries that funds hospitals primarily with lump sum payments, regardless of how many patients they treat, finds a new study released today by the Fraser Institute, an independent, non-partisan, Canadian public policy think-tank.
“Over the last 30 years, the vast majority of developed nations with universal health care have moved away from the financing approach used in Canada towards a system where funding follows patients for hospital care,” said Nadeem Esmail, senior fellow at the Fraser Institute and author of Money Following Patients: A Better Way to Pay for Universally Accessible Hospital Care.