“Drop the Health Bill”

[biffvernon]

Are you telling me that even the Daily Mail have come out against it??

Here's an even more amazing Daily Mail headline:

This is not wartime Nazi Germany and Cameron's attacks on the vulnerable and needy must be stopped

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/artic ... opped.html

It's the kind of article that used to be found in the Morning Star or Socialist Worker.

[Totally_Baffled]

Are you telling me that even the Daily Mail have come out against it??

Here's an even more amazing Daily Mail headline:

This is not wartime Nazi Germany and Cameron's attacks on the vulnerable and needy must be stopped

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/artic ... opped.html

It's the kind of article that used to be found in the Morning Star or Socialist Worker.

OMG Biff Godwins law!!! (ok not you, the article)

It usually takes more than 2 pages of a thread though to get onto the Nazi's!

[biffvernon]

Exactly. It seems we need the Daily Mail to get to it swiftly now.

[vtsnowedin]

How much will your taxes have to go up to keep the current system solvent is probably the wrong question.

Well suggest a better one.
Here in the US employer paid family plans have passed $10,000 per year and are going up at twice the rate of inflation. Your NHS has to be paid for out of your tax bills somewhere or if they have shunted it off on corporations it is buried inside the prices you pay for the things you buy from them. I was just looking for a ball park figure of how far behind they are on a per household basis. is it £250 per year your talking about or £2500 ?

[RenewableCandy]

What I do know is that we pay (indirectly plus directly) a lot less per capita for the NHS than people in the USA pay for healthcare. And, in spite of earning less, eating less and getting MUCH less sunshine (as in, not enough), we, erm, live longer.

[energy-village]

Let's not forgot the US puts almost twice the percentage of GDP into their health system than the UK. Can we afford the US system even if we wanted it?

At least the NHS has the benefit of fairness and some degree of certainty in a very uncertain world (e.g. how long will you keep your job?). I want to keep it.

[energy-village]

Someone once said about the NHS that we want a Rolls Royce but can only afford a Rover.

Perhaps in the future we will only be able to afford a Brompton; plus a lot on health education, disease prevention and taxes on unhealthy lifestyles. Not so bad if we really are all in it together.

[biffvernon]

How much will your taxes have to go up to keep the current system solvent is probably the wrong question.

Well suggest a better one.

How do we get the best health care to the most people for the least cost?

The British NHS gets far closer to the right answer than the US system.

[vtsnowedin]

How much will your taxes have to go up to keep the current system solvent is probably the wrong question.

Well suggest a better one.

How do we get the best health care to the most people for the least cost?

The British NHS gets far closer to the right answer than the US system.

Oh I agree the US system is broken and the proposed fix they have passed will be worse not better. So the NHS is better but it has problems of it's own including rising costs. Would you agree that the best health care system in the world that also bankrupted it's country or patients was of no real net value?

[UndercoverElephant]

So the NHS is better but it has problems of it's own including rising costs. Would you agree that the best health care system in the world that also bankrupted it's country or patients was of no real net value?

The NHS produces very good value for money, not least because the system is largely free from parasitical private companies. There are no shareholders making a profit out of it.

The long-term problem with it has nothing to do with the adequacy of the system of itself. It is partly the result of rising costs of available treatments (expensive new technologies and ludicrously expensive drugs) but mainly the result of a complete absence of demographic realism. The UK has no credible plan for dealing with all those people who were hoping for a long and comfortable retirement while the NHS foots the bill for their extensive medical requirements. We have no idea what to do with all the old people, because the system was designed when most of the people who retired at 60/65 were dead within ten years. The real crisis the NHS faces is exactly the same as the pensions crisis, and I can see no solution to it.

The NHS is of very great net value, but the whole of our society needs to have an honest debate about how we are planning to support the ever-growing army of elderly persons. The future role of the NHS would be a central feature of that debate.

[vtsnowedin]

[ The real crisis the NHS faces is exactly the same as the pensions crisis, and I can see no solution to it.

I think we both see the solution coming but do not want to accept it as reality.
Rationing in both retirements and health care to keep total payouts within available funds is the inevitable answer. You won't get your knee replaced a second time in your eighties just get set into a wheel chair. And even if the Americans figure how to grow you a new set of lungs to replace your smoke crusted old ones you won't get a new set unless you happen to have a couple of spare million kicking about.

[biffvernon]

So the NHS is better but it has problems of it's own including rising costs. Would you agree that the best health care system in the world that also bankrupted it's country or patients was of no real net value?

Rising costs are a bit of a feature. Take my very old mother in law. She got very ill recently. The superb treatment she received meant that she survived. A while ago or in places with less good health care she would have died. Trouble is she is now living on and requiring some health care at some significant cost, hopefully for many years. She is far, far too old to get a job and be an economic asset to the nation. However much loved, she is an economic burden to the state. It's called a civilised society. We're quite proud of it.

[vtsnowedin]

So the NHS is better but it has problems of it's own including rising costs. Would you agree that the best health care system in the world that also bankrupted it's country or patients was of no real net value?

Rising costs are a bit of a feature. Take my very old mother in law. She got very ill recently. The superb treatment she received meant that she survived. A while ago or in places with less good health care she would have died. Trouble is she is now living on and requiring some health care at some significant cost, hopefully for many years. She is far, far too old to get a job and be an economic asset to the nation. However much loved, she is an economic burden to the state. It's called a civilised society. We're quite proud of it.

As you should be.

[UndercoverElephant]

So the NHS is better but it has problems of it's own including rising costs. Would you agree that the best health care system in the world that also bankrupted it's country or patients was of no real net value?

Rising costs are a bit of a feature. Take my very old mother in law. She got very ill recently. The superb treatment she received meant that she survived. A while ago or in places with less good health care she would have died. Trouble is she is now living on and requiring some health care at some significant cost, hopefully for many years. She is far, far too old to get a job and be an economic asset to the nation. However much loved, she is an economic burden to the state. It's called a civilised society. We're quite proud of it.

Yes, but unfortunately you have illustrated precisely why we are not going to be able to afford it for much longer. We cannot go on spending more and more money keeping more and more old people alive for ever-longer while their health gets ever-worse. This is an example of social spending where the more money you throw down the hole, the bigger the hole gets. That's not sustainable even in the good times, let alone when the country is facing bankruptcy.

[biffvernon]

We keep spending on stuff. Only a small proportion of our wealth is devoted to care of the elderly. After we've stop buying cars and TVs and tickets to football matches and foreign holidays in jet planes and nail varnish and roses in February, then tell me we can't afford health care for the old folks.