>>Even with the price controls in Canada, there are drugs for some diseases that nobody but the extremely wealthy can afford. There are drugs that cost thousands of dollars a month, and not a lot of people can afford them, so many just do without. There is no competition to bring down the prices for most of those types of medications. I'm certainly glad I don't suffer from such a disease.
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>Now you want to discuss medical insurance issues?

You want to discuss differences between a health system and a for-profit health industry? How do you imagine to do without mentioning insurance?

>By the way, your side point was that drugs are very cheap in Canada, and now you start talking that they are not affordable. Stay in line.

Ed, need a hand? You fell below your level. He said "there are drugs that cost...", not "drugs cost" nor "all drugs cost" nor "on average the drugs cost". So, there are some expensive ones. But I didn't hear him complaining much.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prescription_drug_prices_in_the_United_States has some interesting things to say - like, why would Congress have "passed legislation to permit imports" if the market was so finely self-regulating that the prices were exactly where the market can easily sustain them, and there's a health tourism all along the Canadian border to the tune of $1 billion a year spent for drugs alone (not to mention all the gas, coffee etc that these tourists consume north of the border).

Which is OK by me, the more Americans see of the rest of the world, the better the chance to improve the world.