Boomers Won't Crash Health Network

By Aaron Derfel, The Gazette

Canada

November 16, 2007 

As Quebec baby boomers head into retirement and start depending increasingly on the province's health-care network, they will not cause the catastrophic impact on government finances that some demographers predict, a McGill University researcher has concluded.

The impact of the aging population in 2030 will be no worse than it was in the 1970s, McGill sociologist Amélie Quesnel-Vallée suggests in her study, disputing the conventional wisdom that public health care is not financially sustainable.

A 2005 government-commissioned report by financier Jacques Ménard noted that at present, the taxes collected from an average of five workers subsidize the health services of one elderly Quebecer. Ménard warned, however, that if population trends continue, in 20 years there will be only two workers to support every Quebecer who is at least 65 years old.

The implications are clear: fewer taxpayers to support a huge population of aging boomers with diseases like diabetes, cancer and hypertension.

However, Quesnel-Vallée argued those calculations are inaccurate, because the demographers divided Quebec's 65-plus group by the rest of the population. She contends that the province's so-called dependent population should include senior citizens as well as those under 20.

According to her revised calculations, an average of 1.8 workers now supports a senior citizen, and by 2030, that ratio will decline to 1.3 workers per elderly Quebecer. By comparison, the ratio in the 1970s was 1.2 workers supporting one senior citizen.

"The rhetoric that an aging population will have a catastrophic impact on the health system can only lead to ageism and can only lead to the breakdown of inter-generational solidarity," she said in an interview after presenting her findings at a conference on public health care.

"I feel that this rhetoric creates a situation of you, the elderly, against us, the young. You the baby boomers, who had it great, against us who are going to have to work through this to pay for your pension and health benefits."

She also suggested that such rhetoric is being used by privatization ideologues to push a private health-care agenda by arguing that public health care is no longer sustainable.

The conference, Public Solutions to Improve Access to Health Care, was held at Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital, and organized by the group Canadian Doctors for Medicare.

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