The Greatest Canadian, according to a CBC poll in 2004, is  Tommy Douglas, the creator of Canadian Medicare. I learned this when a friend sent me a quote from a column by Gail Pettett. Having a habit of not believing everything I am told I looked it up.

Yep, he was No. 1. Douglas started his health reform program in Saskatchewan and then brought it to the nation as a whole, which may explain the differences in wait times, etc., between provinces. His job was probably made easier because Canada was a British Commonwealth and many people had been exposed to the British National Health System.

After admiring the fact a Baptist minister could get the social gospel (Can't you imagine Richard Land of the ironically named Baptist Ethics group fainting over that?), I wandered over to the Great Britons.

Sadly, Aneurin Bevan, credited with beginning the British national health system, only made it to No. 45 in the Great Britons' list. Despite the landslide Labour victory in 1945, it took Bevan 18 months to get the participation of the British Medical Association (which appears to have been as obstructive as the American version), according to Wikipedia. The article says, "Bevan finally managed to win over the support of the vast majority of the medical profession by offering a couple of minor concessions, but without compromising on the fundamental principles of his NHS proposals."

You have probably heard Bevan's quote on the process, "I stuffed their mouths with gold." Unfortunately, it looks like that may be what will have to happen with health care reform and the insurance companies, big pharma, etc., today.

Since, T.R. Reid calls the British system the Beveridge system, I wandered over to check out Mr. William Beveridge, the author of the Beveridge Report. In 1941 (1941!) England commissioned a report on how to rebuild after World War II. Even more amazingly, they actually used it to guide policy!

I was struck by Beveridge's use of one of my favorite arguments for health reform to promote his plan. Again to quote Wikipedia,

One of its most remarkable assets was the convincing manner of Beveridge's argument which made it so widely acceptable: Beveridge appealed to conservatives and other doubters by arguing that the welfare institutions he proposed would increase the competitiveness of British industry in the post-war period, not only by shifting labour costs like healthcare and pensions out of corporate ledgers and onto the public account, but also by producing healthier, wealthier and thus more motivated and productive workers who would also serve as a great source of demand for British goods.

How can American companies compete with those from countries that don't have to pay a significant percentage of their personnel costs for health care? How can small businesses, who pay an even higher percentage of their costs for health care compete with anybody?

Also on the Canadian list was Sir Frederick Grant Banting, the discoverer of insulin. In 1923, 40 years before the invention of Canadian Medicare, the Canadian government honored his  winning of the Nobel Prize  by giving him a annuity to support his research. A good way to get innovation, right.

I bet you thought an American discovered insulin. Earlier, I was trying to think of a major American health innovation: Heart transplant? No, South African. Test tube baby? Nope, England. It was pointed out to me an American invented the artificial heart. Of course, in American we invent things we can sell at a profit!