Oh good grief!!
FYI yes it may seem I have an over-inflated ego but I would have though that maybe one or two posters would have worked out that I am from the UK and consequently regard myself as a guest.
If you want to have lots of arguments and show yourself up as a boorish lout Quincy then fell free to continue insulting the US rather than reading and learning from those who know about their own country. BTW did you look up supercilious or did you hear it once and hold it up for a special occasion ? Well you wasted it!
You flatter yourself that you think you have any sort of imagination at all - numbskull!
Since this is the internet and there are no borders I would have thought that politeness and consideration were all the more important, even if it were only to avoid cultural misunderstandings.
You certainly have the right to your own privacy and I, for one, admire the fact that by not revealing your national identity you are saving other posters from your land from feeling embarassed and maybe even apologising.
If you would like to get in a bitch fight then this is certainly the right forum but what is the point in me kicking a helpless puppy - no fun in that so maybe I’ll just leave you to your own devices.
Monster
Have you been to the UK and experienced our dangerous and decrepit healthcare system ? my goodness if you did I suppose you can consider yourself lucky to have made it out alive.If you haven’t been here then maybe you should.
In the UK you have the choice of using the NHS or going through private insurance plans that’s at least one more choice than you currently have.
I also notice that virtually all of our private healthcare proffesionals were trained in the NHS, apparently the insurance companies and private hospitals love the money they make but are not prepared to invest in training - bloody leeches.
I also note that very many of our former NHS healthcare proffessionals work in the US, I wonder what percentage of medical staff in the US are from overseas and Canada, if you have any information on this it would be appreciated.
I will also add that to fill in the gaps left by them we recruit from other nations especially India, Pakistan etc which leaves them with less medical cover and is not something I’m too proud of.
I would like to see a few posts from people who have had to jump through the hoops to get Medicair and find out how it works in practice, so far we have had folk tell us about what ‘poor people’ can get, but little word from the ‘poor people’ themselves.
Major Feelgood
…, many buy private health care because NHS sucks. So you pay for health care twice. Once for NHS and once when you really need to see a doctor. Please tell both sides of the story. That’s why we don’t want NHS here
If private medicine is so much better then why do private hospitals pay to make use of NHS facilities and staff ?
— Because everyone wants private medicine, so much in fact that they don’t have room for them, so they have to make use of NHS facilities. That’s ironic.
Tosh, tosh and thrice tosh, the number of people who take out private healthcare plans is incredibly small, certainly less than 10% and likely lower than 5%.Actually under the Thatcher administration people who took out private health plans did not pay twice as they and their companies got a tax break - some of your conferance colleagues forgot to tell you that, never mind we’ll clear this thing up eh?
Private health plans were seen in the UK as a class thing more than anything, if you were succesful in the 80’s you had to prove it by having all the acoutrements of success and this was one of them.
You might not know that Thatcher was elected on a ticket of tax cuts as was her successor John Major, as a result there was less revenue what do you think got cut ?
We spend less than 6% of our GDP on healthcare and yet cover everyone, you spend around 16% , rising and covering about 2/3 of your population with treatment centres of choice.One less than desirable result of Thatcher’s embrace of all things US was the rise in the UK of litigation, US healthcare litigation adds significantly to your healthcare costs.
Notice that I did say that when funds were available that US medical care is the best there is, I just wish you would see fit to extend this to all your citizens.
Why do private hospitals use NHS facilities and staff ?
Easy because they do not wish to make an investment in such expensive facilities as this would put the price of insurance up and they would have even fewer clients
Thundering bedpans! you surely don’t use decades old material by a 4th rate comic as the basis for your take on how the rest of the world runs - this is as embarrasing for me to answer as it must be for you to reread!!
Lets clear up a couple of other things for you - some have argued that the US system allows choice of medical practioners, I wonder how many US citizens are well informed enough to make a meaningful decision, if it’s anything like the UK then there is going to be a goodly number of folk would not be capable of understanding the information even if it were presented to them.
I can choose who to sign up as my family practioner and I can change if I wish, same as I can express a preferance for the hospital I go to but likely as not I would trust my own doctor’s advice.
What our NHS is exceptionally good at is emergency treatment but when it comes down to non-immediate treatment it is less than satisfactory.This is not a function of NHS v private at all, it is a lack of funds and the public desire for low taxation.
There is a determination to rectify this but the money has to come from somewhere, no party in the UK can get elected on the basis of increasing taxation for specific things - ring fencing taxation - so instead of income tax other forms of taxation are used.
The Liberal Democrats actually went to the last polls on the basis of ring fence taxation(extra spending on schools and on NHS) but did not end up in a position to influence things 'nuff said.
Even now dumb Brits complain about high fuel taxation and yet moan about poor NHS performance, ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.
Democracy - Since we were the first to outlaw slavery, we have never had a revolution and have been in existance as a democratic parliamentary state longer than just about anybody I would have thought that the robustness of our system against all the unpleasant ‘isms’ is well proven.
The current system in both Germany and Japan, especially in industry was set up according to models concieved in this country - pity it took us so long to do it for ourselves, and upon what is the US system based on - especially the independance of the judiciary which is seen across the world as an important and integral part of democracy.
Twisty
are you saying that Coldfire, London_calling, Mattuk, tomh, yojimbo, micilin, pergau, borndodgy, skinnyGuy, Spinynorman myself or any of the other Europeans cannot comment on US issues?
C’mon you know that is not what I’m saying, the differance is in the words ‘bitching’ and ‘comment’
The thread in GD on NHS systems dissappeared so rapidly I assumed that there was little interest in it from US dopers so there was no point in adding to it - shame really I could have enlightened one or two on its structural weaknesses and the reasons why we spend so little of our GDP on it.
IMHO having your strings pulled by right-wing scaremongering republican poiticians about the perils of social policies without taking the trouble to find out first hand from those who are subject to such systems is defeating the mission statement of this board somewhat.
