It's a tax on the sick -- or their families

VISITING people in the hospital is not usually a very pleasant experience -- if you actually enjoy it, you should probably seek professional help -- but it can be an interesting one.

My wife has been in hospital for the last week or so and, whether she wants me to or not, I go to see her every day. Each visit is much the same. "How are you? How are you feeling? Did you see the doctor? Do you know when you're getting out?"

And each exchange is punctuated not just by question marks, but by furtive glances at my watch. That initial spurt of conversation is kind of like sex on the first date -- as soon as it's over you start wondering, "How do I gracefully get out of here?" -- except that, since it's your wife and she matters, there is no graceful way to get out. The key is finding a way to gracefully stay. And because she is your wife, you do; after a few minutes, you stop looking at your watch and start looking at your wife.

Other visitors aren't so lucky. Family, friends, the occasional wandering patient passing by who roams into the wrong room and settles in until a nurse shows up -- they all ask the same questions and when the excitement of that spurt of conversation has passed, they get anxious to leave; they start to visibly twitch, but there is no graceful way to leave someone in a hospital bed except to just say good night and go to pay your parking, which is the other reason people have been furtively and anxiously looking at watches all evening.

It costs a lot of money to go the hospital. It costs a lot of money to visit someone who is in the hospital.

Over the period of five days, my two daughters spent about $300 in parking fees while they visited their mother. Her friends and other family spent at least as much. (I take the bus.)

The Canadian Medical Association Journal recently raised the issue of hospital parking fees in an editorial written by former interim editor-in-chief Rajendra Kale, who was later relieved of that position when he pointed out in another editorial some immigrant cultures use fetal screening to abort unwanted female children. The CMAJ, it seems, does not much like making medicine relevant to the lives of "ordinary" Canadians.

Kale identified what he calls "parking-centre health care," where patients will cut visits to their doctors in hospital short because they cannot afford to pay for the extended parking time.

Hospital visitors do this, too. That's one of the reasons people wear watches on their wrists, so they can watch the meter ticking without making a big display. Pocket watches are so ostentatious.

Hospital visitors are therapeutic -- they help patients feel better. If that weren't true, neither side would be party to the misery of the hospital visit. As Kale points out, hospitals in Canada are few and far between, even in urban areas.

Most people need to drive to get to them. Parking fees then effectively become a tax on the sick -- it can cost as much as $25, depending on how the clock ticks, to park underground at the Health Sciences Centre for a day. We don't make the ailing and the failing pay directly to see a doctor or go to a hospital. So why do we charge this? Parking fees are one tax on illness that can be abolished or, at the very least, drastically reduced as a health-care expense. Not everyone can take the bus.

...by Tom Oleson

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition February 18, 2012 J2