Doctor’s appeal over right to pay for private health care dismissed by B.C. court

B.C.’s highest courtroom has dismissed an attraction of a landmark choice upholding the province’s public well being care legal guidelines.

A panel of three justices on the B.C. Court docket of Enchantment on Friday rejected Dr. Brian Day’s argument {that a} decrease courtroom decide had made vital errors of truth in denying his constitutional problem to laws that stops sufferers from accessing non-public care when wait instances within the public system are too lengthy.

In his majority reasons for judgment, Chief Justice Robert Bauman wrote that whereas lengthy waits for therapy have denied some sufferers their constitution rights to life and safety of the particular person, these violations are permitted underneath the ideas of basic justice.

Bauman stated the legal guidelines that Day objects to are supposed to guarantee equitable provision of well being care, and forestall the creation of a two-tier system the place entry to probably life-saving therapy is determined by wealth.

“We settle for the private curiosity British Columbians have in avoiding a prolonged wait once they have assets to avail themselves of personal care to keep away from an elevated danger of dying. We don’t decrease the seriousness of that subject,” the judgment says.

“However, we additionally acknowledge that the target of the MPA [Medicare Protection Act] contains guaranteeing that people with out the flexibility to pay will not be thereby disadvantaged of medically obligatory care.”

Problem anticipated to land in Supreme Court docket

The attraction courtroom judgment closes one other chapter in a authorized saga that started in 2009, however the story is probably going removed from over. Day has lengthy stated he expects to combat his case all the way in which to the Supreme Court docket of Canada.

Day opened the Cambie Surgical procedure Centre in 1996, billing privately for a wide range of totally different procedures, together with orthopedic surgical procedures, screening colonoscopies and oral and cosmetic surgery. From 2004 to about 2013, the clinic contracted with well being authorities to supply some companies by way of the provincial Medical Providers Plan.

His constitutional problem, filed with 4 sufferers as co-plaintiffs, took subject with two sections of the MPA that forestall medical doctors in B.C. from billing sufferers above the speed paid by way of the Medical Providers Plan (MSP) and that prohibit the sale of personal insurance coverage that covers therapy supplied underneath MSP.

B.C. Supreme Court docket Justice John J. Steeves dismissed the problem in September 2020 in a judgment that ran greater than 800 pages and was hailed as a “historic win” for public well being care.

Bauman’s causes for upholding Steeves’ conclusions have been written with the settlement of Justice David Harris.

The third attraction courtroom decide, Justice Lauri Ann Fenlon, concurred with the choice to dismiss Day’s attraction, however discovered that lengthy wait instances within the public system are “grossly disproportionate” to the targets of B.C.’s regulation.

Nevertheless, she stated this violation of the ideas of basic justice is justified underneath Part 1 of the Canadian Constitution of Rights and Freedoms, which permits for “cheap limits prescribed by regulation as may be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”

Fenlon wrote that whereas the present system prolongs struggling and causes hurt for many who would be capable to pay for personal therapy, she needed to contemplate the frequent good.

“The unfavourable penalties of putting the impugned provisions and permitting non-public care would trigger those that couldn’t avail themselves of personal care — probably the most susceptible in society — to attend even longer for care, thereby probably growing their danger of hurt — past that we now have discovered to exist underneath the present regime,” she stated in her concurring causes.

The unique trial in B.C. Supreme Court docket lasted 194 days and heard proof from 17 sufferers, 36 medical doctors and 17 representatives of well being authorities and the province. A complete of 590 reveals have been admitted on the file, together with 40 skilled experiences.