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Many Americans are driven to fundraise on the Internet because they do not have, or have inadequate, health insurance

The VON was trapped, and ultimately crushed, by that contradiction. It was not the first - the Canadian Red Cross Society's legendary blood transfusion service flamed out in an even more spectacular fashion with the taintedblood scandal in which 20,000 recipients contracted hepatitis C or HIV - and it will not be the last. Canadian Blood Services has taken over the former Red Cross role.

The health-care advocacy group Friends of Medicare said the neardemise of the VON is proof that "experiments in private care must be ceased." But the VON's story is much more complicated than the "public, good; private, bad" and "notfor-profit, good; for-profit, bad" narrative. For a long time, governments funded not-for-profit groups in the health and social services sectors - hospitals, home care, group homes, the Red Cross and so on - in a pretty loosey-goosey fashion. These groups did good, and they were funded relatively well.

But as budgets soared, new accountability measures were put into place. In the home-care sector, for example, competitive bidding was introduced. Stodgy old organizations such as the VON were not ready, and did not adapt. Their market share fell from more than 90 per cent to about 20 per cent. On the surface, this is a good thing. Canadians spend $219-billion a year on health care, including about $10-billion on home care, and, as consumers and taxpayers, they deserve to get value for money.

While we like to preach the gospel of value-for-money, we don't measure it well - the ultimate irony being that expensive bureaucracies have been built to ensure home-care agencies are lean and mean. The VON had many disadvantages in a competitive market.. place - first and foremost that it never provided just home care to its clients. It delivered hot meals, made friendly visits (especially to veterans), ran adult daycare programs, provided respite care to families, visited new mothers and babies, did flu shots at home and did countless other little things that never had a place in the accounting ledger. Some were covered by government payments, but many were not. The VON supplemented its funds from government contracts with charitable donations. It had more volunteers (9,000) than staff (6,000). The VON also paid its workers a decent, living wage. The work force - mostly nurses and therapists - is unionized, salaried and they have benefits, including a pension plan.

In the brave new home-care industry, piecework is the norm, meaning nurses get paid per visit, and few have benefits, pensions or stable employment. It is also in the interest of workers (and employers) to get visits done quickly, and cram as many as possible into a day. While this is a cost-effective business model, anyone with a loved one in home care knows that there is little continuity of care. The relationships that are so important to intimate acts such as health-care delivery to frail seniors living at home are virtually non-existent. When you have a strict business model, when all that matters is the much-vaunted bottom line, none of that gets counted.

The real tragedy in the VON's unravelling is not that another home-care business is biting the dust (after all, there are hundreds more out there), but that the "old-fashioned" way of delivering care - taking the time required to talk and listen to patients and treating them as people, not "units of service" for example, not just changing their dressings, but feeding them and filling the fridge - is falling by the wayside. With the VON's collapse, we have a home-care system that may be more efficient - at least in theory - but one that has less heart.

But John Frank, a Canadian physician who is now chairman of public health research and policy at the University of Edinburgh, argues in his report that more private health care "would be expected to adversely affect Canadian society as a whole."

"Anything like a user fee is a barrier to people being able to receive medically necessary care and

CATHERINE CULLEN (REPORTER): The Cambie Surgery Centre is taking on the province of British Columbia in court next week, trying to overturn two provincial regulations. One bans private health insurance from medically-necessary surgeries. Advocates of private healthcare says it's too expensive for most people if there's no insurance. The other regulation forces doctors to choose between working in the public or private system rather than letting them to split their schedule. And now Justin Trudeau's government has been accepted as an intervener in the case. CBC News has obtained the expert report federal lawyers will use. It cites numerous studies to paint a bleak picture of a Canada with more private health care, arguing "society as a whole would be worse off." Resources like highly- skilled doctors would be siphoned from the public system. Even bankruptcies if people buy health insurance they can't afford as sometimes happens in the United States. Day says that he wants to see a European-style system with a public/private mix. DR. BRIAN DAY (CAMBIE SURGERY CENTRE):

To me it's a very simple question and that is: if the government promises health care, fails to deliver it, do they have the right under the constitution to stop you or your loved ones from extricating yourself from the pain and suffering that then ensues? CATHERINE CULLEN (REPORTER): The federal government says it's concerned about anything that would create a barrier to quality healthcare. JANE PHILPOTT (MINISTER OF HEALTH): It goes completely against the principles of the Canada Health Act which include accessibility and universality and we're committed to upholding those. CATHERINE CULLEN (REPORTER):

Now, the Supreme Court has already ruled on a similar case about private insurance, specifically in Québec, and in that case private healthcare won. People on both sides of the debate say that this new case could have some very important consequences for the whole country and that it could also wind up in front of the Supreme Court. Catherine Cullen, CBC News, Ottawa. © 2016 CBC. All Rights Reserved.

After much jockeying for position, two companies emerged victorious in the quest for CanWest’s assets. Shaw Communications won the television network and specialty channels for $2 billion, while a new company, Postmedia Network, acquired the newspapers

That leaves Canada’s commercial news media in the hands of a Gang of Seven: the billion-dollar corporations

Many of the chief executives are members of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, promoting its agenda of business-friendly policies.

Insurance companies would like us to believe private health care is preferable. They would like a bigger chunk of the action à la Obamacare in the U.S., where tax dollars flow to health-insurance companies. Private health companies would like us to believe profit pays. And, of course, some wealthy individuals would like to buy their way into first-class care without the annoying wait times and the indignity of being treated like everyone else. The woman with a coffee jones and high anxiety over her husband's stay in post-op was mollified quickly enough. They found him a bed at the Civic campus in a few hours.

Had she been in the U.S. her husband's surgeries could have cost her as much as $500,000 - brain surgery runs anywhere from $75,000 to $125,000 not counting the extras like doctors' fees and hospital stays and convalescence. If she had insurance, there's a good chance a U.S. health-insurance provider would have dropped her long ago. Most of us have had friends or family that have been through the heart bypass or hip-replacement mill. They have survived. They have better lives. They waited, sometimes painfully long, but came out the other end without declaring bankruptcy or selling their homes.

Polls show Prime Minister Stephen Harper's popularity circling the drain as he talks about pipelines and the economy and getting tough on crime. Voters are thinking the crime is his lack of interest in their health and well-being. No, our system is not perfect. Wait times can be long if you're not knocking on heaven's door. The Fraser Institute wants us to know we pay too much - according to their figures a family of four earning about $110,000 pays about $11,000 of their taxes toward health care. If there's an underlying problem, it's our taking this massive system for granted and seeing only the faults. Canada's health care saves and improves lives without the attendant anxiety of how we will afford it. Yes, it can be better. It can use more money. It can be more efficient. But ask the people who have survived a crisis and were treated with dignity regardless of their bank balance, and they'll undoubtedly tell you it works pretty damned well. David Sherman is a Montreal writer and musician.

Although many Canadians complain about the cost of health care, it works much better than they think it does.

Now the four-storey retirement home is under insolvency protection and up for sale. Court documents prepared by the home's owner warn that if a solution is not found it would "jeopardize" the care of the handful of residents now living in the Alzheimer Centre of Excellence near Bathurst St. and Finch Ave. Meanwhile, bills are piling up.

Mostyn and others involved in the process stressed that the residents of the home are the priority in this process. Last fall, Mostyn replaced Frank Dimant, who ran B'nai Brith for 36 years and came up with the plan for the home. Dimant said it took too long to build and he mistakenly kept a sign up saying "opening soon," which led to a loss of confidence in the community as construction dragged on. Those funding the project became concerned. "My policy was always to beg and plead (with the bank) and try for another day," former CEO Dimant said in an interview. "Things caught up, I guess." The Alzheimer Society of Canada states that in 2011, the most recent figures on its website, 747,000 Canadians were living with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias.

Researchers predict that will rise to 1.4 million by 2031. Dimant said he spotted this trend years ago and he envisioned a "beautiful modern facility." B'nai Brith, known for community lodges, social housing, sports programs and its work combating anti-semitism, began designing the project in 2002. Some of the land was donated, some purchased. Donations were sought, and the federal government kicked in money, some of it earmarked for work done for the home by specialists in innovative health care at Western University. Western professor Anne Snowdon would not answer questions about the home, saying "we no longer have any affiliation with this organization."

Just before it opened in 2013, B'nai Brith issued a release promising to "offer new hope to families afflicted by the cruelty of Alzheimer's disease." "We understand you only want what's best for your loved one. And we truly offer the most caring approach to living with Alzheimer's. By offering cutting-edge programs. By collaborating on therapies at the forefront of Alzheimer's research. And by providing the highest quality of personal, loving care that makes the difference between living with the disease, and living."

The home boasts beautiful gardens, well-appointed private rooms, and round- the-clock care. "If you build it, they will come," said Dimant, acknowledging more should have been done to market the home before it opened. The other problems? Officials at B'nai Brith say the monthly charge - $7,500 - was too high. Then there were issues with the home. For example, none of the washrooms are wheelchair accessible. All residents must be able bodied, something that in hindsight was a mistake, officials say. The home opened in December 2013 with four residents. During Dimant's time it rose to 17. Recently, it has reached 20 residents. There are more staff than residents at the home, with 12 full-time staff and 20 part-timers.

nsolvency documents prepared by the home show that in February, the home wrote to the Bank of Nova Scotia to say it would be out of cash within two months and could not continue loan payments. Between then and now, the bank worked with the home (and then the insolvency trustee) to come up with a plan to sell the home. The home cost about $16 million to build and outfit. There were numerous work stoppages, cost overruns, and some legal action regarding unpaid contractors bills over the lengthy construction process. A selling price has not been set for the home. B'nai Brith's Mostyn said he is committed to returning his organization to the community work it has done so well over the years. "My goal has been to modernize the way the charity conducts its business. That means taking advantage of new technologies and improving on the many grassroots initiatives and community services that B'nai Brith provides, like our principled advocacy initiatives, sports leagues, food basket programs and affordable housing," he said.

In his book, Down to the Wire, David Orr explains the difference between optimism and hope, an important distinction when we try to balance our pride in the Canadian health system with our frustrations about its challenges.

Dr. Michael Rachlis's book, Prescription for Excellence,

Monica Dutt is the chairwoman of Canadian Doctors for Medicare, a public-health and family physician, and is based in Cape Breton, N.S. Vanessa Brcic is a board member with the Canadian Doctors for Medicare, a family physician and a clinician scholar in the department of family practice at the University of B.C.