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

We’re already charged through NI

What?
I asked you to back up your statement. I have implied you are pulling it of your ass, because we all know that is where is has come from.

I am not the only one to ask for proof of your statement.

So instead of bleating about me being disgusting, how about growing up and actually providing proof of your own disgusting assumptions about people on benefits.

@Doggielovelouie NI is just a tax levied on working people and employers. It is not ring fenced for the nhs or pensions, as many people believe. What about high use by the non working who aren’t paying NI at all? Maybe they should be charged based on what you believe.

The truth is governments overspend. The NHs needs to change to a system where money is levied outside general taxation and it needs to be far better run. Many parts of it are a shambles and it needs an overhaul. It’s nearly 80 years old and is going way beyond what was envisaged from taxation contributions. We need to review it in the light of evidence from other countries - no one else has a nhs.

It is funded through taxation

maybe the “non working” as you name them use it because they are unwell and can’t work and now you want to charge them

how do you know what I believe from 4-5 words - assumptions again!!!

This is for the person who said they had unresolved issues after 30 years... no idea why it hasn't linked to their post.

Well I would respectfully suggest that there is something else going on if you have not had issues resolved for 30 years.

It is also true that the nhs hasn't just had to deal with population growth, but the relative slashing of its budget - decade after decade.

So in other words your opinion is conjecture based on your own subjective prejudices, so don't expect it to carry any weight with other people. That was an interestingly prim attempt at deflection, though.

Exactly. I've lost count of the amount of times I've either been misdiagnosed or been told there's nothing wrong. I wouldn't be happy to pay for all the testing in having now that should have been done in childhood. I also wouldn't be happy to pay for the appointments I've ended up having because the medication they gave me for one thing has caused other problems, including permanent hearing loss which seems to be getting worse

Where I am from in Jersey we pay for the GP. I can get an appointment the same or next day and they are really thorough and the surgery is nice.

Do we get refunded if the GP dismisses it as anxiety or menopause and then it turns out to be an actual illness? 🤔

Out of interest, anyone who's in support of moving to a private healthcare system (as Reform frequently keep suggesting)...

...you do realise that no pre existing conditions would actually be covered by insurance right? 🤔 So anyone disabled from birth or anyone who's previously sought help for any diagnosis or condition (which ironically would rule out overing most OAPs...who are weirdly frequently in support of the idea).

It's taken me 9 years of GP appointments to get any one to do something to finally sort out recurrent thrush infections. Even when six months of fluconazole didn't work they just wanted me to start again with no scented anything (not used anything scented for twenty odd years, not even washing powder or fabric conditioner), probiotic gel etc.

9 fucking years.

I'm already angry it's taken this long, if I'd had to pay for appointments where what I was saying was dismissed and nothing was done I'd be incandescent.

Employees' National Insurance needs to be payable on all income. Self Employed people need to pay it at the same rate as everyone else. Retired people need to pay it. People who live on a private income need to pay it
Retiring at 67 and expecting another 20, even 30 years of healthcare on maybe 45 years of contributions doesn't add up.

I also think we should all get a statement of how much was spent on our healthcare during the year and cumulatively since birth so we have a realistic idea of how much it actually all costs

Tell me you've never had to deal with a condition that's rare without telling me

I'm waiting to be diagnosed with something which doesn't show up in the usual tests. I'm female and it looks like the condition I may have almost exclusively affects males

As long as people on benefits, including state pension, have to pay too.

They're clueless with thrush. Nothing they did ever helped. Eventually went away itself. Good to hear yours is gone.

Using what money? Many of us already have to pay 20% council tax and many of us will be much worse off under UC

Sounds great - choosing between your health, eating and heating

Turns out it wasn't just thrush. Saw a GP trainee, who was lovely and actually cared, she referred me on, saw a consultant who took one look and asked me if I'd heard of lichen sclerosus.

The lichen and the thrush were probably triggering each other, so fingers crossed now the lichen is being treated the thrush will be sorted, but I could weep at the effect it's had on my life for all those years and within days of starting the steroid cream it started improving.

Absolutely this. You're in cloud cuckoo land @nomas.

So what’s your suggestion, yet another tax on working people?

And you’re on entitled cuckoo land. Now working
people should fund non-working not attending their NHS appts? I’ve heard it all now.

Given 2-3/5 children are not brought to our clinics, and parents are contacted 24hrs in advance and reminded (by an actual person, not an automated text,but someone you actually have to engage with), I'm all for charging people a nominal amount.

I've worked 50hrs a week to get our service to a place where we have no waiting list (if the clinician is on leave, you might have to wait a fortnight) and we are responsive.
People don't appreciate it.
I'm pretty much done with it.

If children aren't brought, it generates a tonne of safeguarding supervision, letters etc so the workload doesn't reduce if they don't come.

@mellicauli Self employed do not quality for all benefits though! Why should they pay for partial benefits? Who should pay is everyone who works regardless of age and everyone who retires early and refuses to pay. So everyone under 65 pays.

Depends on the system. It won't be a private insurance system like we have at present. Other European countries with insurance systems don't have pre-existing condition exclusions. No reason to think we can't have a similar broad based system in the UK. Other countries manage it!

If you want s/e to pay the same rate, then you need to give them the same benefits, i.e. the same sick pay, maternity pay, unemployment benefits etc. The reason the rate is less is because they have less rights when things go wrong. Classic case being covid furlough where 3 million freelancers/self employed were excluded from the support or had support restricted, whereas employed got furlough without the same ridiculous and nonsensical exclusions.

The Affordable Care Act in America also required pre-existing conditions to be covered, as Health Maintenance Organisations there do.

Sometimes it is a fight, though, from what I hear