Canada's aging baby boomers are not the fiscal threat to the country's health-care system that many experts say they are, according to a new report prepared for the commission studying medicare.

If the federal government gets its act together now, the problem of an aging population can be easily controlled, says the report prepared for Roy Romanow's commission on the future of health care.

It found a potential shortage of physicians, who will retire in increasing numbers, more pressing.

"Over all, the conclusion of this paper is that the pressures likely to be placed on the health system by population aging are real, but small enough to be easily managed," says the paper, by two university academics from New Zealand.

"The biggest danger posed by population aging is that, in rejecting the apocalyptic scenarios of those who see aging as a major problem, governments and the Canadian public may become complacent and neglect to take action now at a time when it would be relatively easy to do so."

The paper, written by Seamus and Sarah Hogan of the University of Canterbury, acknowledges that there will be pressures on the system as a result of the population bulge and that costs could rise by 30 per cent by the year 2030. Canadians can also expect to live longer because of such factors as better health care and nutrition.

However, major surgery on the system cannot be justified, the study says, because aging represents a one-time pressure on expenditures and not a continuing growth.

The report recommends that governments begin salting away money now to prepare for the first boomers, who reach retirement around the year 2011. Such a course of action is "not as revolutionary as some who raise the spectre of aging might recommend, but still implies taking the issue seriously," the report says. It says Canada can afford to set aside such savings.

The study also recommends that Ottawa increase transfer payments to the provinces as the country's population gets older, over and above any increases warranted by other rising costs. It also suggests that provinces with larger populations of senior citizens should get more cash, and that the federal government should send money to the provinces in advance so they can set up dedicated savings accounts to meet the needs of aging populations.

The government risks significant damage to the system if it does not move to put money away, it warns.

A greater potential problem is a dearth of physicians, the paper says.

Because the aged use physicians and nurses more than the young do, there will be a greater need for health professionals in the future. The study cites Health Canada research that projects a 30-per-cent reduction in the number of physicians during the next 50 years. Half of that number can be attributed to doctors who are baby boomers themselves.