Is Canadian health care a contradiction in terms?

Steve Chapman talks about the statist Candian health care system:

The typical patient needing orthopedic surgery has time to get pregnant and deliver a baby before being called. The Supreme Court cited the testimony of one orthopedic surgeon that 95 percent of patients in Canada waited over a year for knee replacements--with many of them in limbo for two years.

In some cases, the delay lasts longer than the person enduring it. Or as the Supreme Court put it: "Patients die as a result of waiting lists for public health care."

Not many MRI machines up there in Canada.Chicago Tribune