British fear 'American-style' healthcare system

[dtotire]

British fear 'American-style' healthcare system
As leaders debate ways to reform healthcare, politicians repeatedly tell a worried public that Britain will not turn the National Health Service into an 'American-style' private system


By Henry Chu, Los Angeles Times

June 13, 2011
Reporting from London—
Two years ago, Britons were outraged when U.S. politicians like Sarah Palin, in the debate over healthcare reform, turned this country's National Health Service into a public whipping boy, denouncing it as "evil," "Orwellian" and generally the enemy of everything good and true.

It's time for some payback.

Britain is now embroiled in a healthcare argument of its own, prompted by a proposed shake-up of the NHS. And the phrase on everyone's lips is "American-style," which may not be as catchy as the "death panels" that Palin attributed to socialized medicine but which, over here, inspires pretty much the same kind of terror.

Ask a Briton to describe "American-style" healthcare, and you'll hear a catalog of horrors that include grossly expensive and unnecessary medical procedures and a privatized system that favors the rich. For a people accustomed to free healthcare for all, regardless of income, the fact that millions of their cousins across the Atlantic have no insurance and can't afford decent treatment is a farce as well as a tragedy.

But critics here warn that a similarly bleak future may await Britain if a government plan to put more power in the hands of doctors and introduce more competition into the NHS succeeds — privatization by stealth, they say.


more:
http://www.latimes.com/health/la-fg-britain-health-care-20110613,0,1237142.story

[marmar]

1. They should.

nt

[Poll_Blind]

2. As they should!

PB

[QuintanarooBoy]

3. Oh, don't worry

I spent the summer of '04 in Bath. "American-style" is every bit as effective as "death panels." Rec.

[bemildred]

4. Heck, I fear the US health care system. nt

[Scuba]

5. Me too. Biggest worry and expense in my retirement.

[nichomachus]

6. I'm an American

and I fear the American-style health care system. Those insurance companies will kill you without remorse if they can make an extra nickel.

[kirby]

7. Paul Revere warned you! n/t

[Lifelong Protester]

8. Everyone should fear "American Style" healthcare system

or at least "American style -free- market -the- insurance -companies -will -bleed -you- dry- and -leave- you -for -dead" system.

[Uncle Joe]

9. The British would be wise to trust their instincts, don't come down

this disastrous, dysfunctional and immoral path.

Thanks for the thread, dtotire

[Enthusiast]

10. They are right to fear it.

Because it is horrible.