Canada has a publicly funded health care system, called “medicare”, and is designed to ensure that all residents have access to medically necessary hospital and physician services, without cost to them. Instead of having one national plan, they have a national program made of 13 interlocking provincial and territorial health insurance plans, all of which have in common benifits and basic standards of coverage, all provided and executed under Canada’s Health Act.

Individual governments are responsible for the all aspects of health services for their residents, depending on the province or territory.