Manageable costs

The CIHI has released its numbers on Canadian health spending for 2006. And based on the CIHI's data, health-care costs are well under control - though you'd never know it from the CP's coverage:

The Canadian Institute for Health Information says Canadians will spend $148 billion on health care this year, more than $4,500 per person.

The statistics agency says 2006 health spending is expected to exceed inflation and population growth for the 10th straight year. The trend to increased funding began after deep cuts in the 1990s precipitated a crisis throughout the health system.

In fairness, the CP at least recognizes part of the reason for the trend. But on a closer look, its analysis misses entirely one of the stronger themes of the CIHI's findings, which is that this year's growth is levelling off compared to previous years:

Health care spending in Canada is expected to reach $148 billion in 2006, an increase of $8 billion over last year, according to figures released today by the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) in its annual report on health care spending. National Health Expenditure Trends, 1975–2006 projects that total health care spending in Canada will increase by 5.8% in 2006 over the previous year. This increase is slightly lower than the estimated annual growth rate of 6.4% in 2005, and lower than the average yearly rate of increase (7.8%) from 2000 to 2004. After adjustment is made for inflation, health expenditures in 2006 are expected to grow by 3.7% or reach $120 billion in constant 1997 dollars.

In other words, a substantial amount of the raw-dollar total is attributable to inflation rather than real spending increases. And once population and economic growth are taken into account in addition to inflation by shifting to a percentage-of-GDP basis, health spending has levelled off almost entirely over the past 3 years:

CIHI’s estimates also reveal that while health care spending as a share of Canada’s gross domestic product (GDP) is expected to stay relatively stable this year, it remains at its highest level in 31 years. Health care spending as a share of GDP is expected to reach 10.3% this year, compared to an estimated 10.2% in 2005 and in 2004. Health care spending as a proportion of GDP was at its lowest (6.8%) in 1979, climbing to a 10.0% peak in 1992, before dipping and rising again to its current high level.

In sum, the story surrounding the CIHI's findings isn't that health-care spending is unmanageable, but rather that it's entirely under control as the deficiencies of the 1990s are worked out of the system. Which means that the real danger to Canadian health care isn't the actual cost of the system, but rather the ideology of those who would take the raw numbers out of context to pretend that our current expenses are unsustainable.