Medicare is the unofficial name for Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

's publicly funded

Public sector

The public sector, sometimes referred to as the state sector, is a part of the state that deals with either the production, delivery and allocation of goods and services by and for the government or its citizens, whether national, regional or local/municipal.Examples of public sector activity range...

 universal health insurance system

Universal health care

Universal health care is a term referring to organized health care systems built around the principle of universal coverage for all members of society, combining mechanisms for health financing and service provision.-History:...

. The formal terminology for the insurance system is provided by the Canada Health Act

Canada Health Act

The Canada Health Act is a piece of Canadian federal legislation, adopted in 1984, which specifies the conditions and criteria with which the provincial and territorial health insurance programs must conform in order to receive federal transfer payments under the Canada Health Transfer...

and the health insurance legislation of the individual provinces and territories.

Under the terms of the Canada Health Act, all "insured persons" (basically, legal residents of Canada, including permanent residents) are entitled to receive "insured services" without copayment

Copayment

In the United States, the copayment or copay is a payment defined in the insurance policy and paid by the insured person each time a medical service is accessed. It is technically a form of coinsurance, but is defined differently in health insurance where a coinsurance is a percentage payment after...

.