A Globe and Mail reader, joining the parade of those castigating Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams for having the audacity to make his own decisions about his own health, complained that the wealthy politician may have given private health care supporters their greatest endorsement, whether he realized it or not.

He complains most Canadians couldn’t do it because “unlike most modern Western countries, the private option is only available to those with money and a passport.” That’s tantamount to the old adage about the kid who murders his parents then complains that he’s an orphan. Of course most Canadians don’t have that private option available. That’s because Canada is the only democratic country which continues a government monopoly on health care. It is our system, not Williams, which denies Canadians options.

Every other country offers some combination of private and public health care. Not Canada, eh? No room for “choice” here, even though as the Supreme Court’s 2005 decision in the Quebec Chaouilli case showed, this policy - which results in lengthy waiting lists - ends up killing Canadians. They die waiting for treatment.

But hey, that’s not as important as protecting the “purity” of our Soviet-style, state-run healthcare, although Quebec at least - which seems to always operate under its own set of rules - have followed the aforementioned 2005 case by allowing private insurance to cover various types of surgery.

A 2009 Fraser Institute report found that the mean wait times remained at 16.1 weeks for surgical and other procedures, exactly the same level they were in 2001 before governments poured billions of tax dollars into “improving” the situation.

If you think Williams, as a politician, has a “public duty” to use the public system - despite the fact his doctors recommended the Florida clinic for his particular heart problem - he’s not the first politician to decide that his own health trumps some outmoded philosophical debate.

Former MP Belinda Stronach, for example, had breast cancer surgery in California. The late Quebec premier Robert Bourassa had skin cancer treatment in Maryland. And even holier-than-thou NDP Leader Jack Layton had a hernia operation at a private Toronto clinic. Say it ain’t so, Jack.

Actually, by paying his own way, Williams not only saved money for our system but opened up an operating table somewhere for somebody else. That’s what choice does.

Every year, despite this ridiculous national fixation on “public” health, tens of thousands of Canadians flock to the U.S. and abroad for health care. Unlike Canada, you see, the American system - part public and part private - is far more advanced than we are in coming up with new surgical and medicinal techniques. Why? Because - dare we say it? - they believe competition leads to better results, even in health.

Look to any European country of your choice. You’ll find they too have a health system which mixes the public and the private components and most of them - not all - have better overall outcomes than we do.

In its’ editorial attacking Williams, The Globe wrote that his decision to go south for his operation “belittles Canada.” What nonsense.

Williams says, “This is my heart, it’s my health, it’s my choice.”

The Globe agrees it is his choice but argues that by making that choice “it reflects on the quality of medicare. The message he has sent by word and deed is that Canadian medicine is stuck in the past century.”

Well, it is stuck in the past century, at least in the sense of insisting on the holy grail of the so-called “public option” as the only “option,” which means, of course, that we don’t believe there should be an “option.”

Why not? We have options everywhere else. We have public schools, for example, but people are entitled - if they pay - to send their kids to private schools. That doesn’t hurt the public system. It actually helps. It means fewer kids at public expense. Same thing with public transit. You can use Toronto’s subway - and you help pay for it whether you’re a user or not - but nobody says you have to use it, or you can’t drive your car or take a cab. That’s up to you.

Ah yes, you say. Not everyone can afford “choices.” Exactly. That’s why we need public systems too. In European countries, for example, everybody pays into public health, but there is also a private option - which you have to pay for - and which a relatively small percentage of people opt to do. But not in Canada. Oh no. If a man decides to seek what he feels is the best care for his own health - and particularly if he is wealthy (the cad!) - well, he’s simply unCanadian and not worthy of holding public office.

Think about it. Isn’t it time we joined the rest of the world and offered our citizens real “choice” in healthcare? Or, as the old advertisement put it, “Try it. You might like it.” Everybody else does.