Anything that starts "In Canada, ..." is generally suspect. Canada is a confederation. Most things are in the purview of the provinces, so there's rarely a globally applicable rule. Canada does not have a single healthcare system, but thirteen separate provincial and territorial healthcare plans.

You're not guaranteed to be covered for 6 months. If you leave permanently and settle within Canada, BC will cover you for the remainder of the month plus two months (enough time to establish residency in the destination and get coverage). If you leave the country, you are covered for the remainder of the month.

If it's a temporary leave, however, several of the provinces do cover you outside of the province, and many will extend your coverage for quite a long time depending on the circumstances. BC allows you to retain coverage for a 2 year trip during every 5 year period. They also (like many provinces) will extend your coverage as long as you're in school full time in another location.

Fair point on each province being different.

BC does not cover care outside of Canada (assuming that’s what you meant by “2 year trip”) with the exception of emergency care at a max of $75 per day.

https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/health/health-drug-covera...

Varies by province. In Quebec, they have a similar absence rule to what you described (for being outside Quebec even if in another Canadian province), but they entirely exclude absences of under 21 days from the calculation, and they have a bunch of exceptions, including a "once every 7 years" exception for miscellaneous personal reasons including leisure vacations that just requires you to notify them in order to qualify. And in theory they will reimburse expenses outside of Quebec, even outside of Canada, but only at Quebec's very low rates.

Still, yeah, very different than how US health insurance works, agreed.