For-Profit MRI/CT Clinics Reality Check It is is ethically and morally wrong to allow wealthy people to buy their way to the front of the line. Putting profits ahead of patients is wrong. According to Dr. Michael Rachlis, the Ontario MRI plan is totally unworkable. It is a violation of the Canadian Health Act to charge for "medically necessary" services. People would be allowed, under the Ontario proposal, to pay for their own "non-medically necessary" MRI scan. However, if the MRI scan showed a problem that would be defined as medically necessary, the patient/clinic would then be able to bill OHIP for the service afterall. In situations like this, individuals would get faster treatment because of a quicker diagnosis simply because they were able to afford to pay for an MRI privately. For-Profit MRI/CT clinics simply don't make fiscal sense. If we supposedly don't have enough money in the public health-care system, then we surely don't have enough money for private companies to make a profit while delivering the same MRI services as a public facility. Private, for-profit MRI/CT clinics will hurt the public system. Ontario, for example, is already facing a shortage of technicians and radiologists to run public MRI/CT machines. Allowing the private, for-profit sector to deliver these services will surely hurt the public system. Where are the technicians/radiologists going to come form to run the additional MRI/CT machines? The public system! For-profit MRI/CT clinics are not about providing care to patients. Nor are they about easing the strain on the public system, improving service or providing choice. For-profit MRI/CT clinics are about corporate profits and ideology. __________________________________________________ For more information on MRI/CT Clinics: Scanning For Profit: A Critical Review of the Evidence Regarding For-Profit MRI and CT Clinics by the Ontario Health Coalition Private MRI Clinics are a Threat to Medicare CBC Exposé on for-profit delivery of diagnostic services Read the Diagnosticare letters Skewed Health Care    August 2003 MRI Fund Misused   February 2003 Private Clinics Not The Magic Solution:   September 2002 Two-Tier Foes Oppose MRI Clinics MORE REALITY CHECKS Public funds are for patients, not profits!