Quote:
Originally Posted by SamIam
Food for thought. I especially liked the comments on "rationing." Why people here in the US don't understand that medical care here is rationed is beyond me. If you are out of work or if your employer doesn't offer health insurance, you are screwed. Health care for low income Americans is abysmal and life expectancies in parts of America - especially the South - are actually dropping. When it comes to life expectancy world wide, I believe the US now stands at 17. And our infant mortality rate compared with that of other nations is a national scandal.
As your article points out, the US spends almost twice the percentage of it's GPD on health care than the UK does (15% vs 8%), yet the UK has universal health coverage for its citizens while a large minority of US citizens go without.
I am baffled by the whining here about how wonderful private medical care in the US is when our system is extremely costly and run for the benefit of big pharma and doctors who play the system for kick backs, etc. The patient is steam rolled in the scramble for the dollar.
Yeah guys, US medical care is just great. NOT!
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In the interests of balance, here's another American experience of British healthcare:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26794291...care-uk-vs-us/
As the article says, quality is variable, and I must say that much of my experience of hospitals is better than this, but not all. Emergency and acute care is probably the most problematic in terms of the difficulties the writer encountered. That tends to be where the worst of the staff shortages, bed/ward/hospital hopping and overworked nurses can be found.