User fee minuet: Claude Castonguay, former provincial Liberal cabinet minister, so-called father of Quebec medicare and recent advocate of user fees, has been appointed by Quebec's minority government to head a 3 person task force to examine the “sustainability” of the province's health-care system. Quebec Finance Minister Monique Jérôme-Forget mandated the task force to examine all manner of options, including the expansion of private clinics and the introduction of federally-prohibited user fees as a potential new source of revenue for the health system. Imposing user fees would require amendments to the Canada Health Act, but Jérôme-Forget argued that the provinces may need such flexibility if they are to absorb spiraling health care costs. The task force is also mandated to “define the role the private sector can play to improve access and reduce wait times.”
Training flap: British Medical Association Chair James Johnson resigned last month after 4 years at the helm when tempers flared over a letter he wrote to a newspaper defending the controversial Medical Training Application Service, which is used to match junior doctors to specialist posts. Trainee doctors argue the appointment system, under which over 34 000 graduates are chasing 18 500 training posts, is flawed and unfair because of poorly designed forms, technical failures with online applications and the shortage of available posts. British Medical Association Treasurer Dr. David Pickersgill said that while Johnson's letter “reflected the Association's agreed position of working towards a pragmatic solution for this year, its tone failed to reflect the anger being currently expressed by members of the Association, particularly junior doctors. It was felt to be insufficiently sensitive and has led to a loss of confidence in the chairman.”
Marijuana profiteering: Auditor-General Sheila Fraser has announced that her office is “in the early stages of an audit of certain user fees” associated with Health Canada's medicinal marijuana program. But Fraser cautioned in a letter to New Democrat Member of Parliament Libby Davies that her auditors are not necessarily investigating specific allegations that Health Canada is charging patients marijuana fees that are 15 times higher than the department pays for the weed. Davies had requested an audit while accusing Health Canada of “bankrupting” people with chronic pain. The audit also followed the launch of a court challenge from the Vancouver Island Compassion Society alleging that the medicinal marijuana program is failing to meet the constitutional rights of critically and chronically ill Canadians.
Global deaths: Mortality rates for communicable, maternal, perinatal and nutritional causes will decline over the next few decades, except for HIV/AIDS, according to the World Health Organization's annual World Health Statistics report. Noncommunicable conditions are projected to cause 70% of all deaths by 2030, during which the 4 leading causes of death globally are expected to be ischaemic heart disease, stroke, HIV/AIDS and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. World Health Statistics 2007 is available at http://www.who.int/whosis
It's a wrap: The World Health Assembly wrapped up its 60th session by adopting a resolution requiring the World Health Organization and its 193 member states to establish an international stockpile of vaccines for H5N1 and influenza viruses that might result in pandemics. The resolution also binds the World Health Organization to “formulate mechanisms and guidelines aimed at ensuring fair and equitable distribution of pandemic-influenza vaccines at affordable prices in the event of a pandemic.” The Assembly also approved a nearly US$900 million increase, to $4.2 billion, in the World Health Organization's budget for 2008/09.