A couple of points, here:
(1) Due to Canada's socialized health care system, many Canadians just cannot get elective proceedures in their home country. So, they come to the USA. This will tend to skew the numbers. The Canadian "private" costs will be less and the USA "private" costs will increase, even though it is Canadians who are paying for and receiving services. I have no idea how much this affects the total numbers (maybe not a lot, but maybe when you consider all foreigners), but it is issues like this that also need to be factored into the equation.
(2) In Canada, there is a crises. Not just a "health care" crisis, but a "what happens when we just don't have enough doctors" crisis:
http://www.liberty-page.com/issues/h...shortage2.html
Socialized medicine creates all sorts of disequalibriums in the system. If socialized medicine was really the best way to go, then the old USSR would have lead the world.
~ zynner