America.....Views from the Road.

Crankyfeet

It's good that you bring up some negative story about the British NHS. I have British friends who, before the current groupthink in America of late that a national healthcare system like Canada's, Britain's or even Cuba's is great, complained that the public "free" healthcare often meant that you went on a long waiting list for anything more than minor treatrment, and most people who could afford it, went private in any case. The NHS end product was often not that great as well (hearsay again).

Since this has become a big political issue, and since Michael Moore's (of whom I don't have a personal opinion either way) movie, you'd think that government healthcare meant free great healthcare for everybody for no expense.

IMHO, instead of an NHS, the current system needs to be tweaked to take out the self-reinforcing weaknesses, rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Of course the whole healthcare industry is against what "needs" to be done IMO because they benefit from the status quo.

Same problem exists in America with the legal system and tort reform as well as Specialists (guys who provide liquidity) on the floor of the NYSE. The powers-that-be have a vested interest in a flawed, innefficient (and lucrative to them) system.