A couple of years ago, Paul Krugman assured us that government-run healthcare was a good idea, writing that “In Britain, the government itself runs the hospitals and employs the doctors. We’ve all heard scare stories about how that works in practice; these stories are false.”
Well, if the stories are false, the British press must love to tell negative lies about their own nation, as I’ve pointed out in a series of often-horrifying blog posts here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
And now there’s a new revelation that further demolishes Krugman’s assertion. But more troubling, it also provides a glimpse at America’s future with Obamacare. Here are some cheerful excerpts from a story in the UK-based Independent.
Hip replacements, cataract surgery and tonsil removal are among operations now being rationed in a bid to save the NHS money. Two-thirds of health trusts in England are rationing treatments for “non-urgent” conditions as part of the drive to reduce costs in the NHS by £20bn over the next four years. One in three primary-care trusts (PCTs) has expanded the list of procedures it will restrict funding to in the past 12 months. …According to responses from the 111 trusts to freedom-of-information requests, 64 per cent of them have now introduced rationing policies for non-urgent treatments and those of limited clinical value. Of those PCTs that have not introduced restrictions, a third are working with GPs to reduce referrals or have put in place peer-review systems to assess referrals. In the last year, 35 per cent of PCTs have added procedures to lists of treatments they no longer fund because they deem them to be non-urgent or of limited clinical value. ..Bill Walters, 75, from Berkshire, recently had to wait 30 weeks for a hip operation instead of the standard 18.
I’ve never pretended the American healthcare system is perfect, largely because of massive government intervention and control. And even a laissez-faire system doubtlessly would generate some horror stories.
But I feel very comfortable in stating that the United Kingdom is a good example of why more government is never the answer for problems created by government involvement in the first place.
I think you also need to know that the British people value their National Health Service greatly. So much so, that the current Prime Minister, David Cameron omitted to tell the electorate of his plans to fundamentally alter the way it works. Given that public satisfaction with our health service was at an all time high prior to the last election, Cameron knew the British people would not have supported his plans for its reorganisation and would not have put him in power if he had been honest about his intentions.
I don’t know of anyone in Britain who wants to swap our system of comprehensive care free at the point of need, for a privately run insurance based system, except perhaps those who merely want to make profits out of the sick.
What else can Paul Krugman say? He asserts in NYtimes “Recession is caused by global warming”! Anyways, If he says Brit health-care stories are false, then they must be true.
For Brits, maybe many of them have become comfortable with what they have, even if imperfect. But that is no reason to ignore follies and not striving to make it better.
But govt. care is never good, in any country, acc. to my experience.
Re: Janet
“I don’t know of anyone in Britain who wants to swap our system of comprehensive care free at the point of need, for a privately run insurance based system, except perhaps those who merely want to make profits out of the sick.”
How about those with cancer? Why don’t you take a look at what the survival rates are in the US compared to not just the UK but every other nation in the world? It’s no surprise that many Europeans and Canadians with the money to do so choose the US for major operations instead of their own countries.
[...] Cato’s Dan Mitchell has a lengthy back-catalog of NHS horrors here. [...]
Those who want to make money, or those who want the nation to stop losing money? It’s not free. The costs are simply hidden or pushed off onto future generations.
“I don’t know of anyone in Britain who wants to swap our system”
Me, for one.
[...] Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Denmark and Sweden all exemplify the disasters that come with a completely government-run system. In every country with government-only health care — a public option monopoly — medicine and treatment are rationed on a systemic level. And yes, countries with socialized health care do have death panels. (My book Remaking America: Welcome to the Dark Side of the Welfare State accounts for the health care disaster in Sweden. For another good account, see here.) [...]
[...] poked fun at Paul Krugman for his views on health care and British fiscal policy, and I’ve semi-defended him about unemployment subsidies and [...]
[...] poked fun at Paul Krugman for his views on health care and British fiscal policy, and I’ve semi-defended him about unemployment subsidies and [...]
“…for a privately run insurance based system, except perhaps those who merely want to make profits out of the sick.”
Of course not. YOU prefer to have a sub-standard system, where you personally pay only a small fraction of actual costs. Of course, I would be FORCED to help pay for your ‘cheap’ crud.
Me, me, me.
I prefer a higher-standards system where my family will not f@cking DIE: if I have to personally pay more for it, then, well, I can live with that.
Of course, under the private insurance system, it would NOT cost me more… but what the Hell do you care, right? After all, it is my ‘moral duty’ to ‘help’ you and your 10 welfare brats, ain’t it? If this socialistic garbage ends up KILLING my family, well… you certainly couldn’t care less, even if you put some effort into it.
[...] poked fun at Paul Krugman for his views on health care and British fiscal policy, and I’ve semi-defended him about unemployment subsidies and housing [...]
[...] about the sometimes-deadly shortcomings of government-run healthcare in the United Kingdom (see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here), so I like to think I’m relatively immune to [...]
[...] the Obamacare debate, Paul Krugman told us we could ignore stories about what was happening across the ocean, writing that “In Britain, the [...]