We need to start charging for NHS services

[Fragmentedbrain]

£15 for the GP
£20 for A&E
NHS routes to paid-for fast track treatment
Options to pay for nicer rooms

We need to stop putting working people on disability benefits for want of a functioning health service it's barbaric

The thing is not to “pay” for the GP but to discourage people who decide they fancy seeing a doctor for a chat because they’re bored / lonely and also discouraging people from not bothering to show up when they’ve decided they CBA to get out of bed or are too hungover or have something more fun to do.

A major reason - possibly the single biggest reason - why people don't make it to a GP appointment is that they are too ill (old, feeling frail today) to go. Add to that the missed buses, and ADHD, the other legitimate stuff that gets in your way, especially when you're not rich. So now you have to have a system whereby people are grilled by an assessor (presumably working for Crapita or Serco) whose job is to work out if you are taking the piss and deny you a refund of your deposit if so. And they are told to deny X% of all cases. And since the deposit is £15 they can only spend 3 minutes doing the assessment.

Remind me how brilliantly that all worked out for disability benefit claims?

You would end up with people being unwilling to make an appointment because £15 is a lot of money to them, and now you've introduced yet more class-based discrimination into what is supposed to be a universal system. The NHS is there for piss-taking scrotes too, and I don't mind that, because I don't want to live in a society where some oik from Crapita gets to judge my scrote level.

I know it’s not easy and I hear what you say, however I don’t believe £15 once/twice a year is going tip people over the edge. It’s about £1/£2 per month or equivalent
and its not for nothing, it’s to have instant access to the healthcare they need.

Again as I’ve said, the alternative is limited to no access now pretty much

I feel like Reform are putting a lot of targeted threads on here recently. This is just ridiculous. Go and pay private if you want. Leave us the fuck alone.

Make it like France/Belgium/Germany

All these "how will it work" problems have already been solved! People on benefits can go for free. People with jobs have insurance (not much, comes out your salary as PAYE, probably less than the % of your taxes going to the NHs now).. When you go to the GP, pay €20 and get ±15 back (or whatever, this is what it cost a decade ago). It all works a million times better

Obviously don't make it like America.

It's politically unpalatable but something has to change!

Yes because you can just "match fit" away serious conditions 😒

I’m unsure how £15 would suddenly ensure ‘instant access’ without a lot of investment first. There are not enough GPs, and a lot of the ones we do have are shit and have inconsistent training.

I recently had to pay £250 for a private appointment to get a correct diagnosis for my 1 year old because the GP couldn’t be arsed. Not £15.

Because a lot of people who either don't really need a doctor or don't bother turning up would think twice about misusing the system.

Thus freeing up space for genuine people. Yes it may cost, but it'd be a better run system and if people genuinely can't afford it, the cash reserves would be there to help.

Well then, if you find the idea of a benevolent state so intolerable and prefer a survival of the fittest approach, there are countless other countries you could move to, aren't there? Personally I'm glad this country at least attempts to help those in need.

You are very much mistaken if you think all people on UC, the disabled and chronically ill qualify for a motability car or that those who get PiP get a high enough rate to qualify it. Then they pay for their car with that benefit. It’s not a ‘free’ car.

It would also discourage those of us with long term conditions to get the help we need

I have a few genetic health conditions. Nothing I can do to stay "match fit"

I live in Hong Kong where citizens are charged even in public hospitals and clinics. It's equivalent to £40 soon, we get charged per day inpatient fees, we have to pay a flat rate of around £5 for rare public clinic appointments unless it is a blood test but the fees for casualty and clinics cover medicines.

The doctors just stare at computer screens during the appointments. There are next to no physical checks.

It still doesn't work. All of the public medics have left to go abroad or leave the public sector for private. This means a huge shortage of public doctors, impossible - to - access appointments and casualty waiting times of over 72 hours in some cases in winter. Public hospitals are murderously expensive.

It's not about charging. There are no doctors.

So if you break your leg you’ve got to go to the GP first to be referred or pay £100?

We’re not talking about privatising it, simply paying a small token amount that would really help towards hiring/training etc…also if you have to pay then people are less likely to abuse the system.

Regarding your specific situation, I’ve been in the same boat because they gave me an appointment with the specialist nurse who ‘wasn’t sure’ so DS was placed on a 6 month waiting list for the specialist. I paid £130 for a 10 min private appointment because it was worth every penny to know he was ok. Had he been seen my the GP they would have absolutely been able to identify the problem so total waste of time and money and stress.

The irony of the is argument is… anyone who has a pet has to pay “megabucks” for treatment or investigations for that pet.
If you have a pet, the argument is you can afford to pay for a GP or A&E visit. “Cut your cloth so to speak!

For instance, £245 for a comprehensive blood profile on a cat and £58 just for a vets consultation.
So people are vastly underestimating the reality of the cost of a GP. Charge need to be higher than £10/20

We all need to become more resilient and start accepting more responsibility for our own health.
We’ve been led down the dependency pathway in this country.
The era of personal responsibility has gone and we need to bring it back beginning in schools.

Yes the NHS need total overhaul.
For instance, theft from the NHS must be vastly underestimated. Who hasn’t taken home a roll of Micropore tape? And masks during Covid?

A public service constantly ripped off by disgruntled employees.

The issue with the NHS isn’t with the staff.

Presumably they'd simply die so the elite can harvest their organs and live. (Sarcasm)

Wish I could. The health conditions have meant that’s a pipe dream
but then if everyone gets a better paid job we won’t have any staff in call centres, supermarkets, admin…

Christ I can't believe people see the American healthcare system and suggest even a partial foot in the door towards it.

Do you want to be financially penalised for being sick or orderly? At some point in almost everybody's life they go onto fixed income. How do you expect sick pensioners to afford food, housing (as many will still be in rentals) to manage their health conditions and on top of that to heat their homes at massively inflated energy prices?

What happens when it becomes like the NHS dentist and low income families no longer can get NHS GP appointments because they don't offer them and only want to fill contribution based appointments?

It's diabolical and punishes the poorest and most vulnerable in society the sick the disabled and the elderly.

Anybody who wants to come for the NHS should have to face all of us standing in the way to protect it. I cannot stand people the sloppy half baked idea that it somehow won't apply to you because you're so middle glass you can afford cancer.

Yeah i think in some ways it may help stop people taking the piss. (My friend is a midwife and she regulardly tells me about women turning up too late for appointments with no valid excuse).

However, I think too many people would be relunctant to pay as well as pay tax right now, just because of how shit the care is, and how much money is wasted internally.

I asked my GP to cancel a referrel for my DC, they didn’t. So time was then wasted when I had to call the hospital to cancel it myself and they sent me 2 letters confirming it had been cancelled, which I didn’t need.

But the options aren’t black and white to be America or NHS. There are many systems that work in a hybrid manner. France, Portugal, South Africa.

I mean just this year I’ve had
haematology appointments x 2
dermatology appointment
pre op appointment
endometriosis surgery with an overnight stay
uti GP appointment x 2
blood tests every 12 weeks
ECG at the doctors
smear test

none of these are conditions I can do anything about, autoimmune conditions travel together

And they all spend more.

When I was 21, I was renting a flat, paying all my bills, working two jobs and studying for a degree.
I remember one winter, I was so, so ill. I went to the GP and was diagnosed with a chest infection and prescribed antibiotics. Only, I couldn’t afford the £10 or whatever it was to buy them. So I just had to go home and be ill. If you’ve never been in a position where you can’t afford to eat for the last two days before pay day, you’ll never understand the struggle.

If we start charging for GP appointments, the rich will be fine, the unemployed will be fine, but it’ll be those just keeping their heads above water who will drown. It will result in those people not going to the GP and will cause unnecessary deaths.

So, no. I massively disagree with you.

I mentioned prescription contraception to be made chargeable to those who can afford it. (It would cost me about £20 a year).

I wonder if they would consider a trial where they asked customers to pay voluntarily at point of collection and see how many would.

There’d be so many exemptions it wouldn’t make much difference. Don’t work? Don’t have to pay. Do work? Have to pay but can’t afford it so don’t go and end up getting signed off work sick.