NHS Meltdown: The Implosion Continues
What is left of the NHS in the UK is continuing its awful meltdown. Now, the bureaucrats in charge intend radical surgery. From the story:
Needless to say, protests are expected over what looks to be a loss of local care for many conditions. And the moral of the story is that centralized health care simply does not work.Scores of hospital departments such as maternity units and cancer clinics will be closed or merged across the country under plans for a radical shake-up of the NHS...
The plans, which appear to have been held back until after last week's local elections, will be released over the next four weeks by the nine Strategic Health Authorities in England. They include setting a local target of reducing the four-hour wait in A&E to two hours, setting up dedicated trauma centres and better co-ordination of out of hours services.However, in many cases, the changes--which result from Lord Darzi's continuing review of the NHS--will lead to services provided by cottage and district hospitals being moved out of the area.
posted by Wesley J. Smith @ 6:37 PM
6 Comments
6 Comments:
Or it could be the fact that the NHS is chronically underfunded and has been under constant assault from government after government, that since its inception has been trying to find ways to cut back on health care. A better example of socialized health care is in Sweden which spends about 25% more per person than the UK, yet per capita expenditure on health is more than $2500 dollars less than the US(Americans spend $5711 per person, Sweden spends $3149). The percentage of government revenue spent on health in the US is 18.5% Sweden is 13.6%, and it must also be taken into account that the 18.5% of government revenue only covers 44.6% of the total health care cost, where as in Sweden the 13.6% covers 85.2% of the total cost. The reason why so much more money pays for half as much care? Profit.
life expectancy in the US is 77.5 while in Sweden its 80.5. That's only if your a lucky American with insurance, if your one of the unlucky 48,000,000 you win a fantastic prize of a 25% higher chance of dying each year, and in in 2007, twice as many people died from lack of health insurance as died from homicide. So the real moral of the story is that social health care is cheaper, more efficient, more humane, and provides better results.
My local hospital states that it is there to serve the weak. Though I am not of their denomination (Catholic) I delight to see that care for the sick is the prime stated value. The strong wish to serve the weak.
But if government health care in the US is nationalized,
and the "kill the disabled" people get in control...
-with officials trained on the VALUE of euthanizing the "unfit"
we too will have our killing fields - like the Netherlands.
Our own Washington State and Oregon lead the way.
columbian_leaf, can you give us a reference for all of that?
life expectancy in the US is 77.5 while in Sweden its 80.5
Given the radical demographic differences between the two nations, comparing simple life expectancy is of dubious value here.
...and in in 2007, twice as many people died from lack of health insurance as died from homicide.
How can you possibly determine "death from lack of health insurance"?
This comment has been removed by the author.
The other comment messed up the page.
For the deaths compared to homicide there's the study that was done by Families USA. It shows California but it was done nation wide.
http://www.familiesusa.org/resources/newsroom/press-releases/2008-press-releases/dying-for-coverage-ca.html
For the Health expenditures there's the UN human development report, and the WHO's World health statistics 2007. http://hdrstats.undp.org/indicators/52.html
http://www.who.int/whosis/database/core/core_select_process.cfm?strISO3_select=ALL&strIndicator_select=nha&intYear_select=latest&fixed=country&language=english
Sweden has a population of 9 million; the US of 300 million.
Thus, there may be OTHER factors why a small country (more equivalent in size to one of our states) has better, cheaper health care and even longer life.
Russia is said to have about 142 million. That chunk of the former Soviet Union also is said to have life expectancy about 12 years behind the US.
And THEY are the SUPER SOCIALIZED MEDICINE PEOPLE of all time!
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home