Why politicians have no business running healthcare, part 92927
Radiology at the Royal Free Hospital
Originally uploaded by dynamist.
I’m trying really hard to ignore M*ch**l M**r* and his intentionally dishonest movie (documentary? As if.) about socialized healthcare. Having read about how he misrepresents the NHS, which I have had firsthand, hellish experience of over the last decade, I know there is nothing but frustration in trying to reason with people who want so desperately to believe that government healthcare is a progressive, not destructive, thing. They will buy the line that M**r* sells them hook, line, and sinker.
But I wonder what they’ll make of this:
One in four hospitals is so unhygienic it is putting its patients’ lives at risk, it is revealed today. Ninety-nine out of 394 English NHS trusts are breaching a Hygiene Code brought in to combat an increase in hospital-acquired infections such as MRSA…The Healthcare Commission watchdog is publishing figures today as part of an annual ‘health check’ of English NHS trusts.
More than 100,000 patients contract hospital-acquired infections every year - costing the NHS £1 billion. One in every 250 death certificates now cites the C.difficile superbug as a contributory or main factor, with one in 500 mentioning MRSA.
(Photo above taken by me at the Royal Free Hospital in North London in October. The caption from that photo reads: Thank God I was wearing a dress, and so didn’t have to put on one of these mucky gowns. I like their neat, organised system; I was barked at when I asked if I needed to wear one, but couldn’t discern which words the barker was trying to speak. At the lefthand side of the photo, you can just about make out the corner of a gurney. An obviously very ill woman was laying there for quite a long time before anyone paid her any attention, and there was a man on another such gurney just a few feet down the hallway. What a horrible place.)
Posted in Life
June 18th, 2007 at 3:47 pm
I know you’re going to call me a right-wing jingoist again … because, well, I don’t completely agree with you. But here’s where I do agree: the National Health System is broken. I have lost several close relatives to MRSA infections — secondary infections they developed after being admitted for unrelated primary issues. My mom postponed back surgery because she didn’t want to catch something while she was in hospital. That’s ridiculous.
I’ve been sick in New Zealand and received much better free health care. I was sick once in Vietnam and I received much worse free health care. Scary free health care. But I’ve been sick in the US and I didn’t receive any free health care at all.
So, actually, I DO agree with you … but I suspect that’s because we’re both white, educated, employed, reasonably young, healthy and free of chronic illness. And if one of us was not all or most of those things, well, maybe we wouldn’t agree after all.
June 18th, 2007 at 3:59 pm
Chris, I never called you any of those things - which is easily verifiable, as the whole exchange is on this website - and if you continue to claim that I did, I will ask you to stop commenting here. I don’t feel obligated to indulge people who won’t deal with reality.
BTW, there is no such thing as “free” healthcare - somebody pays for it, and under the NHS, we all do, regardless of whether we use it, under force of law.
What I would say is that there are people in the US who do not have to pay for their healthcare, as they are too poor to do so. Most Europeans don’t realize this, and will vigorously deny it, despite reality.
I do not know why anyone would expect free healthcare in any case. Why should nurses and doctors donate their services? Why would drugs companies ever bother to develop life-saving treatments if no one was to pay for them? We do not all expect free food, shelter, water, and clothing, so why do some people expect free healthcare?
Here’s a recent exchange with a friend that infuriated me:
My friend is in his/her early 30s, with a high-profile job as a contractor (not an employee, so gets no health insurance from his/her employer). He/she drives a nice car, lives in a nice apartment, wears designer clothes, and pretty much lives the sort of comfortable existence that eludes many people.
Friend has to go to the hospital for an emergency. Afterward, friend starts to panic about how he/she is going to pay for the hospital visit. Turns out that, on paper, this person only made a few thousand dollars last year, so won’t have to pay a dime. He/she seemed quite pleased with themselves when they told me this, but I was stunned. (I would add that this person is all for this fantasy of “free” healthcare.) When I pointed out to him/her that they are contributing to the high cost of healthcare in this country, they just laughed.
Why on earth should everyone else carry the burden for people like this, or for people like a family member of mine, who chooses to spend all of his money on travel, designer clothes, pets, and nights out? Those people fall into the fabled X millions of uninsured, and I have no sympathy for them whatsoever.
June 18th, 2007 at 4:52 pm
I was actually just joking about my first point, but if you want to be pedantic about it, here’s what you wrote: “especially considering the “Love it or leave it” line you threw out…you know, the sort of argument favored by jingoistic right-wingers.”
It’s a little Clintonian to claim that you didn’t actually CALL me a jingoistic right-winger, when instead you compared me to them.
Anyway, Jackie, I think you really misunderstand me on this issue. I don’t understand why we can’t have a discussion about it, maybe I have something to add. I was trying to be friendly. I thought you might welcome posters with alternative views. Surely you can’t only want people who agree with everything you write to read this blog? You seem to find disagreement very unpleasant and I thought it’s what blogging was all about. I honestly thought this was an opportunity to have a discussion in another medium. I don’t get the hostility. And so I think my not posting again is probably a good suggestion, and one I shall take.
I understand there is no such thing as free health care, but I’d rather fund socialized medicine than the genocide my tax dollars is currently funding in Iraq. The $300 billion we’ve spent could go along way to eradicating simple diseases here and abroad. That’s all I’m saying. Just because I’m European doesn’t mean I don’t understand the way the system works. I’ve spent the last 12-years working in the health-care system here in Cincinnati. I’m a researcher at UC, and a one-time employee at Children’s Hospital, so I understand how it works.
I just don’t understand why you’re so unfriendly. But I don’t need to be your punchbag, that’s for damn sure.
June 18th, 2007 at 5:00 pm
Chris, I don’t know why disagreeing with you is “unfriendly”. If I was a bloke, would it be “unfriendly” to disagree with you without adding lots of smiley face emoticons to my words? Come on, your skin can’t be that thin.
I agree with you on one thing: You should not have to contribute to those state causes which you find morally reprehensible. You should be able to opt-out of funding the war, and I should be able to opt-out of funding government healthcare. If only we lived in that world, and not one where the force of law and threat of violence is used against us to make us pay for whatever the state says we have to finance…
June 18th, 2007 at 6:05 pm
Disagreement is fine; the constant condescension sucks though. I’m sure people have told you that before.
On your other point: Maybe we should tax people who partake in risky behavior, or habits that potentially impact their health … smoking tax, obesity tax, early-onset diabetes tax, recreational drug use tax? Then they’ll get credits for eating vegetables and driving carefully.
June 18th, 2007 at 9:35 pm
Chris, the plain truth is that I do have a difficult time taking people seriously when they hold what I consider ridiculous views. I don’t want to hurt anybody, so I am trying not to do so, but I am imperfect and sometimes my real opinion will shine through. I don’t wish to hurt you, but I also am not prepared to pretend that I can take what you say seriously. Perhaps because I used to hold views like yours, and you are reflecting qualities about my old self that I don’t want to be reminded of, my reaction to those views is more apparent. Believe me when I say I don’t wish to hurt anybody. But I also feel you’ve got to have the courage of your convictions and be able to argue persuasively, rather than complain that the big kids are being mean. If so, why not just take your ball and go home? No one forces you, or anyone, to read or to comment here.
As for your idea: Why bring the government and taxes into it at all? Instead of people paying ’sin’ taxes - which involves the government making value judgements about how individuals choose to live their lives, thus curtailing their freedoms - just…buy your own damn insurance!
The fact is, once you give the government a stake in your personal well-being, it gives the state license to curtail all sorts of freedoms. Hence ’sin’ taxes, people who smoke or whose BMI numbers are judged too high being denied healthcare in the UK, etc. I believe that everybody is born with the right to do stupid things to themselves; no one is born with the right to my financial support to repair the damage done.
June 19th, 2007 at 11:02 am
You threaten to ban Chris from commenting, and then when he actually pulls the direct quote he was referring to, you never respond to that aspect again. It is not that “disagreeing” with him is unfriendly Jackie, and you know that. Threatening to ban him absolutely is.
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June 19th, 2007 at 11:50 am
Heather, the reason I didn’t mention the quote is because it makes it perfectly clear that I did not call Chris any such thing. (Check out the whole comments thread for yourself, where he also has the delusion that I called him a racist, despite the fact that the false nature of all of his accusations are easily verifiable by reading the actual thread.) I didn’t feel the need to rub it in anyone’s face that the quote proved Chris was making stuff up. But now that you mention it…Well, yeah, it does.
Again on the delusion tip, I did not “threaten to ban” Chris. Yeesh. If we could please deal with reality and not with imagined conversations that didn’t take place, that would be cool.
But since you brought it up, Heather, this blog is not a public utility, and is indeed my private property. I treat it much as I would my home: I do not feel obligated to host jerks or those who would soil my property. If I’m spending more time trying to get a person to acknowledge reality and to abandon fantasies than I am actually learning from them or having a productive conversation, they’re not contributing anything worthwhile. My time is worth a lot, and I refuse to donate it to unworthy matters. Again, no one forces you either to read or comment here, so if this is not to your liking, please feel free not to come here. (And no, that’s not a “threat”, but a very serious suggestion.)