No hospital for you!

When the maternity ward was closed at the hospital in the Solleftea district of northern Sweden early last year, the nearest alternative was 100 kilometers (60 miles) away by road. So the local midwives decided to teach expectant parents a new skill: how to deliver a baby in a car.

Ah, the joys of socialized medical care.

“We have money,” said Hanna Hedvall, 45, who lives in Solleftea and worked as a midwife at the maternity facility for six and a half years. “We may not be able to have specialist care across the country, but here we are talking about rather simple things.”

Then on top of that:

Resentment has built over the influx of more than 600,000 immigrants over the past five years, many from war-ravaged countries like Afghanistan and Syria, a huge number for a country of 10 million people.

Yeah, the government in Sweden can't build enough hospitals but it has no problem handing out billions of dollars to unwanted rapefugees.

There are also soaring crime rates, gang violence, complaints about education and pregnant mothers even being turned away from maternity wards due to a lack of capacity. The number of people waiting longer than 90 days for an operation or specialist treatment has tripled over the past four years.

This is not a unique or surprising phenomenon limited to Sweden. Canadians are experiencing delays when it comes to important surgeries. Why? Government debt, limited hiring of new doctors, and increasing population. If you're in this situation, then save as much money as you can for a medical emergency. When the bad news comes, travel to a country where doctors and surgeons take cash. It'll be expensive but it's better than waiting in line and risking serious decay or death.