A new analysis of the cost of medical care shows Canadians spend at least twice as much on health care as their counterparts in other OECD countries.
In 2015-16, Canada spent $20.6 billion on health, up from $18.2 billion in 2016-17, according to a report released Thursday.
The increase is mainly because the country has spent more on health in recent years, but also because Canadians spend significantly more on their prescriptions, doctor visits, prescription drugs and hospital stays, according the report by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.
The report says the increase comes despite the fact that overall health spending in Canada has decreased by about 20 per cent over the past decade.
“Our analysis shows Canadians are spending more on medical care than their peers in other countries,” said Paul Beaudry, the report’s author and a researcher at the Canadian Policy Centre.
“The only countries with a comparable share of GDP in terms of spending are the United States and the United Kingdom.
They are spending even more than we are on health.”
The report said that despite spending more than $40 billion on healthcare in 2016, Canadians’ share of the world’s health care spending was still only about 10 per cent.
Beaudsley’s analysis found that the average Canadian spends an average of $1,500 on healthcare annually.
The average spending by Canadians for prescription drugs is $1.6 million a year, and for hospital stays and medical equipment, $2.1 million.
The Canadian Centre estimates that health spending has risen by about 40 per cent since 2000, and is projected to grow by another 10 per, cent by 2032.
It also noted that spending by non-Canadians is still much higher than the U.S. and the U,K.
In 2016, U.K. health spending was more than three times that of Canada, while U.A.E. spent more than twice as many dollars as Canada.
“That’s an enormous amount of money,” Beaudys report noted.
It also found that spending on health has increased across age groups, even though the proportion of Canadians who live in poverty has dropped. “
It’s a gap that we’re not making up.”
It also found that spending on health has increased across age groups, even though the proportion of Canadians who live in poverty has dropped.
In the past, Canada had a large proportion of working-age adults who relied on public health services, the Centre found.
The number of adults ages 65 to 64 with no health insurance declined from 24 per cent in 1999 to 14 per cent today.
And the number of people in this age group with a family income below $75,000 also declined from 16 per cent to 11 per cent between 1999 and 2015.
Beudys report said the gap is largely because of the high costs of prescription drugs, which are the primary source of health care.
“If you take out the cost per prescription drug, which is what we are spending on, and you have to look at the total cost of all the medical equipment and supplies that we use for that, it is very, very large,” Beudies report said.
“You have to add in the total spending on the medical supplies that are actually in the system, and the total for prescriptions, which includes the cost for doctors and hospital visits.”
The authors say the increasing amount of spending on healthcare is in part because Canadians are not getting the best value for their health care dollars, and that is due to high health care costs.
“One of the things that we see with Canadians is that they are spending less on health than the OECD average,” Beydys said.
The study comes at a time when many Canadians are worried about their future.
While most of Canada’s population is working, the number is projected at an all-time high of 10.4 million people by 2027, with some analysts predicting the number will reach 15 million by 2036.
Canada has had two recessions since 2006, which have contributed to a steep increase in the number living in poverty.
The Centre report said there is no evidence to suggest the country is on the path to a full recovery.
But it noted that there are many factors contributing to this, including the ongoing recession and the ongoing health crisis.