To wonder if people who slate the NHS so much

[FutTheShuckUp]

Would find it so much better living in counties without it?
Sure it's not perfect but I just don't get the amount of vitriol which is aimed at the NHS at times

I slate the bureaucracy of the NHS, not the staff. Big difference.

As with anything, some areas of it are excellent. Some areas are poor. With any infrastructure that size you will have monumental waste and duplication of tasks.

On the whole we are lucky to have it.

No health service in ANY country is perfect. The NHS is understaffed, under-resourced, and in extremely high demand. We should all be incredibly grateful for it. If you are genuinely sick, you will get the care that is needed. That's the thing: it's based on NEED rather than WANT. Patients are not customers. That is why it is so brilliant.

Oh but they've paid for it don't you know.

If people actually looked at the proportion of tax that they pay in relation to the costs of what they actually take from the NHS (antenatal and maternity care being relevant on a parenting website), it's not such a bad deal we're getting after all. :)

Very simplistic terms I know. But you get my point.

Well it depends. I don't live in the UK and have access to a fabulous nhs and corporate health insurance that means I can access specialist care instantly. Obviously this is preferable to rations but if I lost my job I would be grateful for the less good healthcare. Doesn't mean the nhs is brilliant, just free.

Although I have saved enough go pay for anything major in the future

The NHS is great in theory but can be very poor in practice, depending on where you live (and to me this postcode lottery aspect detracts from the universal aspect).

I now live in France, where you have to pay a bit for healthcare (sliding scale according to income) but it's loads better.

I don't think people should slate the NHS completely but I also don't understand the complacency some people have about it, there are a lot of serious problems that need to be fixed.

EVERY healthcare system has its problems.

The terrible shooting at the Batman screening in Aurora left many dead and many others in hospital. Including a man whose wife has just given birth to their child. She will be bankrupted by his medical bills. And not because of lack of insurance, but because insurance doesn't cover everything. She'll have hundreds of thousands of dollars of 'excess' to pay. And that's if you have insurance.

I have never lived anywhere people were actually left to die if they didn't have a chequebook, just clocks up a debt. Please tell me where they do this so I can avoid it. Certainly never happened in Africa, India, bangladesh, USA or middle east.

And Africa was fucking brutal in every other way

I don't "slate" the NHS, I do understand that it is unsustainable in its current state and that it needs modernizing and improving.

And yes, I live overseas and have paid access to a vastly superior health service. What I pay subsidises those on lower incomes.

My dad was South African, it happened where he lived, so i'm not quite sure what planet you lived on.

I worked with people from all over Asia and they said that people died were they come from and unless you had the money most of the treatments available here couldn't be accessed at all.

i work with people who are HIV positive and the drugs are not world wide available to treat this condition.

Someof the problems come with drug laws and predujce, but even contraception isn't available unless you can pay for it, or get involved with research.

Well as much as people shouldn't generalise and slate the nhs, it is a bit ignorant and patronizing to slate the rest of the world because of an incorrect assumption that the UK is more benevolent and civilized and doesn't 'leave people to die'. I have lived in many places

'Just clocks up a debt'

So people who have a sick baby spend the rest of their lives trying to pay back its care to the point that they can't afford to put a roof over its head or feed it?

The Aurora hospitals are waiving uncovered expenses, after there was so much press about it. Also, it is a law in the US that you have to treat emergencies regardless of whether people can pay.

Medical bankruptcy is a huge problem in the US, at the same time hospitals very frequently do write off debts that they know they have no chance of collecting.

The problems I saw in Africa were not about access to healthcare.

I slate the bureaucracy of the NHS, not the staff. Big difference.

Very well said, that sums it up for me.

In the US you're better off in prison if you need expensive care.

No-one gives you a heart transplant if you can't afford it. No-one pays for antiretrovirals. No-one gives you chemo for free.

Not getting into this. I don't want to slate the nhs either. At least I have actually lived in the world and have something to compare it to. Why bother arguing when I agree.

The Aurora ones might be this time, but think about every other person who's a victim of crime or just unlucky. Fall down a flight of stairs and lose your house.