To wish I could stop paying into the utterly broken NHS black hole

I still love how people keep saying that the nhs is the envy of the world, yet there isn't another country that has copied the idea

I know of at least one person , who has been fobbed off by gp and now is terminal , my grandparent had a heart attack in hospital and nobody told anyone in the family, strangely enough the attitude of senior nurses on the ward my dm was dying on changed after I noticed she had been given the wrong medicine and pointed it out, the only member of staff on that ward that was worth anything was a healthcare , she was so caring , this was the same hospital that put my dm on a ward with d&v when she had sepsis, a week after her first chemo, oh and my dm worked for the nhs

It should be better.

If you think a private system would deliver better care to more people across a broader range of conditions including life-threatening emergencies…….you’re deluded

You think the UK is the only place with universal health care predominantly funded by government?

Why would you think that?

Obviously as you know, you can tell me then of all these countries that have the same system as the uk

There should be a tax break if you pay private health insurance. My sil was diagnosed with breast cancer earlier this year. Thanks to my brother getting private health, she was able to get her scans, tests surgery & be nearly finished with chemo since April. On the NHS she was told she would be waiting at least 8 weeks for her scans & then another wait for chemo. Her cancer is stage 3 & very aggressive, her consultant has told her that if she had waited for NHS treatment, the chances are it would have progressed to stage 4 by the time she got treated, instead she has one more chemo session, a 3 week break then starts on radiotherapy. I have seen the invoice for just what she has had up to now & the bill was shocking, over £30k up to when the bill was generated, so the NHS has been saved that much, a reduction in NIC if you have private health would encourage more people to pay it, even a 1% reduction would be worth it.

25% IS what is paid in tax - which equates to a week's wages. That's according to the pie chart on the back of an annual P60. The largest portion of income tax goes on welfare, I believe.

So not totally spot on with the figures - but saying she's 'delusional' is quite a leap. And, to be fait, the tax issue is arguably the least important takeaway from the entire OP.

I agree with this. It is ridiculous that some people pay twice.

Quite. So a person can't get a GP appointment on the NHS... but if they've got 50 quid, they can see that same GP privately within a few hours?

She doesn't pay a week's wages each month of her salary to the NHS on £30k. She's way off.

It's free for the patient paid for by taxes.

Germany, Italy, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, France, Greece for exemple..

The attitude of these medical professionals makes no sense. HPV has a dormancy period in which it cannot be detected in tests. This period can be decades long. It's appalling that you have been told a negative HPV test proves you can't ever have contracted HPV.
Furthermore, if you have successfully fought off the virus, you will test negative. That does not mean the virus did not do cell damage when you had it. I'm in this position. I had it, fought it off and tested negative, but am in the high risk category for cervical cancer and have already had a growth removed.
I'm genuinely shocked at the ignorance of the "doctors" you have been dealing with. Wtf.
I don't know anything about the NHS as I'm in Canada, but I do believe strongly in socialized medicine. It does need to be sufficiently funded and properly managed. That's the solution, not getting rid of socialized medicine.

It's been underfunded by the last Government who wanted to give it over the US healthcare companies
I can understand why you are angry but getting rid is not the way to go

Yes, there could be cell damage even if the virus has left the body.
However, I'm not understanding what you mean about the pap smear being separate from checking the cells. Looking for cell abnormalities is what a pap smear is for. If they detect an abnormality in the cells there's no way to prove HPV caused it, though my gyno did say he thought it was over 80% likely to be the cause, because most cervical cell abnormalities are caused by HPV.

So? Is this an MN thing or a UK thing? I don't live there and I have literally never heard anyone discuss how much they "contribute" to the health system - or any other system - here. Everyone expects the same treatment, as they should.

OP has had shocking treatment, and I can understand her questioning why she is paying for this - but why oh why are so many of you intent on showing how clever you are by calculating how much she actually does, or doesn't contribute. IT DOESN'T MATTER!!! The point of her post is the treatment she has not received, not the amount she has paid it. What is wrong with you all?? Some of you seem to have got your money's worth from the NHS with your empathy bypass.

"OP has had shocking treatment, and I can understand her questioning why she is paying for this - but why oh why are so many of you intent on showing how clever you are by calculating how much she actually does, or doesn't contribute. IT DOESN'T MATTER!!! The point of her post is the treatment she has not received, not the amount she has paid it. What is wrong with you all?? Some of you seem to have got your money's worth from the NHS with your empathy bypass."

This! So many horrible posters here

I needed healthcare in the USA a few years ago. Broke a bone which needed pinning. $45000. I was in hospital for three days. I do not want to be on that position here, thanks.

Her gynaecologist realised there was an issue and allowed the patient to be triaged out of the door by the bureaucracy. That's potentially letting someone develop cancer just for a quiet life. Shameful. I am not any kind of medic but I do have people that I am responsible for and I would never, ever take no for an answer when advocating for them.

My friend works here but is French and continues to pay her contribution to the Fre ch system for herself and family. When she had cancer she was determined to be treated in France and was despite being a UK tax payer and her Italian husband is also a higher UK tax payer.

My dad ended up paying cash for his various operations eg hernia, cataracts etc. He did get cancer treatment from the NHS but the NHS failed to diagnose his very severe back pain as a secondary tumour and gave him antidepressants to manage it rather than a CT scan! He paid a lot tax over the years and was a committed tax payer as he was born in a work house. The NHS let him down and left him in pain for about 5 years with cancer secondaries - any GP worth their salt should en aware that when someone has had cancer and then presents with severe back pain unresponsive to cocodamol secondary cancer is a pretty likely issue.

I would prefer the French system as it seems more efficient.

Whilst on my many nights in hospital with my son I was woken up by the arrival of a family from Pakistan who had flown over after a road accident and were being treated in a UK hospital. I’m not sure if they paid but it seemed like they had flown over to get NHS treatment. The car accident had been a day or so beforehand. They arrived in the middle of the night and the commotion was huge hence being told by nurses that they had just arrived from abroad.

However seemingly health tourism is not that much as it might appear and talk of people flying over when 8 months pregnant are not as much as the newspapers make out. I don’t knew what to think on that as like anything there are 2 sides to the story.

However this could not happen with the French system and health tourism does not exist as much. In the UK doctors don’t want to play the role of fund guarding but they get paid regardless in other countries they have no such scruples as their pay depends on the hospital getting the income.

The biggest issue to the NHS is life style choices and I’m shocked that crisps, cakes and ready made meals are not hit with a super tax. These things need to be luxury and not a regular thing. The aisles of crisps in the UK are astounding. I say this for my sake as when I have them in I eat them. Clearly crisp manufacturers must have a huge hold on government. A super vat of 10% in addition to the 20% would raise so much money as it would spread across a huge pool of people. In turn the money should. En used to reduce the price of fresh fruit and veg.
We need more nanny state to remove temptation.
Why don’t we have this as it makes so much sense. Also all take away owners need to pay a super tax.

I completely agree with you and am shocked at previous posters and their views. Are they based on ignorance or what? This, or similar, is going on all the time. Wait to see how posters react when it's them, or their mum!

I can only suggest going private, but also firmly requesting referral on the nhs, so your nhs record stays parallel.

Peopleare being so weird about National Health Service.
"well they might let you dir of cancer BUT!!! They would like... Save you if you had accident so stop complaining".

You all need to look at other European countries and their models and numbers really. People can have healthcare without debt you know. It can actually quite work. Frankly, UK NHS was already famous for beinh bit crap and just giving paracetamol well before Tories came in 2010...

There is a reason many EU immigrants in UK fly home regularly for medical stuff. And havebeen for decades

Same where I am from. 1x a year free check. Paid via state in combination with our insurance companies (everyone has insurance paid via % of salary, state covered if cannot work, so everyone can afford it).

I had my gynecologist since 16 for yearly check ups🤷

Me too! In fact, I even asked my private GP this before she did my smear test. I’m hpv negative and haven’t had any new sexual partners. I asked her what the point in having a smear was if they were just going to check my hpv status and she couldn’t answer! She said it was a good question and she’d go away and research it.

As well as being very sorry to read about the OP’s experience, I am sorry to read about your family’s experiences too, which sounded too familiar to experiences at a hospital near Windsor that my grandfather was admitted to several times and sadly died in ultimately. The only person my mother, who spent the majority of time with him there, saw who showed anything resembling “care” was from an HCA.

OP, YANBU and other PPS including @XChrome have hit the nail on the head. The ignorance from the doctors you have been dealing with is shameful. I think you should be reporting them as one or two others have said.
Your experience brings to mind what one of my lecturers said about the NHS 17 years ago: it should be renamed the National Sick Service. There seems to be massive gaps in terms of preventative care even when you have patients who are predisposed to life-threatening conditions.

I’m in complete agreement with @Nat6999 about a tax break existing if you pay for private health insurance. One of the first things I did earlier this year when eligible was opt in to the cover I can get through my work. I decided to use the 24/7 GP that’s part of the cover. I honestly think this is worth what I pay towards the cover each year alone. I managed to get a virtual appointment on Easter Monday - booked on Easter Sunday night - and the level of care was exceptional.

According to WHO, 99% of Cervical cancers are due to +ve HPV, so you may be worrying unnecessarily.