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Thursday, August 27, 2009

Cruel And Neglectful Care Of One Million British Patients Exposed

There must be something in the water over in the United Kingdom these days. Lately, there seems to be no end of news items exposing how poorly the socialized health care system they have is serving its intended goals. That is to say, NHS is shaping up to be a huge failure.

From Rebecca Smith of the Telegraph UK:

In the last six years, the Patients Association claims hundreds of thousands have suffered from poor standards of nursing, often with 'neglectful, demeaning, painful and sometimes downright cruel' treatment.

The charity has disclosed a horrifying catalogue of elderly people left in pain, in soiled bed clothes, denied adequate food and drink, and suffering from repeatedly cancelled operations, missed diagnoses and dismissive staff.

The Patients Association said the dossier proves that while the scale of the scandal at Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust - where up to 1,200 people died through failings in urgent care - was a one off, there are repeated examples they have uncovered of the same appalling standards throughout the NHS.


Those who read my blog on a regular basis know very well what the mention of Mid-Staffordshire refers to.

And I cannot stress enough that if this had happened here in the United States, it would be the lead story for CNN and the front-page headline for the Washington Post and New York Times for at least a month-running.

Here are some more examples of how a socialized haelth care system would treat its patients, especially those for whom care is to be rationed:

Pamela Goddard, a piano teacher from Bletchingley, in Surrey, was 82 and suffering with cancer but was left in her own excrement and her condition deteriorated due to her bed sores.

Florence Weston, from Sedgley in the West Midlands, who died aged 85, had to remain without food or water for several days as her hip operation was repeatedly cancelled.


Treatment of seniors under any socialized health care sytem is especially bad, and would still be bad under a U.S. socialized health care system.

Socialized health care has been a disaster everywhere it has been tried. We do not want to bring that disaster here to America.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

'Cruel And Neglectful' Care Of One Million NHS Patients Exposed
Rebecca Smith
The Telegraph
August 27, 2009

2 comments:

Franklin Wu said...

The thing is, the part you call a "huge failure" is only a small small fraction of what goes on. If you posted everything that didn't go wrong in with everything that does go wrong, you find that these case are rare.

Also, even in the United States with our current state of health care, we have errors that occur as well. In the United States, it gets worse with doctors "milking" people's insurance with unnecessary procedures and the like.

You have to think about the people without health care as well. The people who currently can't afford health care because of it's hiked up prices are more than willing to accept universal health care, even if the rare case of mishap does appear. It's better than not being able to see a doctor at all because of cost.

Obama has made clear that people don't have to change over to universal health care. People are more than welcome to stay with their current provider.

With all the options, what is bad about health care? The treatment will be up to par and much better for those without health care. This will insure that the millions of people who do not have insurance to be covered. It does not have to be socialized for everyone if they choose not to.

84rules said...

Franklin,

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. Allow me to respond point-by-point.

The NHS or socialized health care system in Great Britain made a promise of 100% coverage for all patients. In fact, those who extol the virtues of the British NHS are extremely fond of pointing that out. So, when the care provided becomes subpar or even non-existent, it is a huge failure of the system. If the system cannot provide 100% care, the system and those who support it should not be touting 100% care as a selling point.

I do acknowledge that there are errors made here in the U.S. In fact, I have never denied that. But errors on the scale of what is happening in Great Britain are not happening on that scale here. Again, I point out that if such a thing were happening on such a scale here, Old Media would be milking that story for weeks on end.

As for doctors milking insurance companies with uneccessary procedures, you really need to check your facts rather than just parroting a Democrat talking point. Alot of unnecessary tests are done, not to milk the insurance companies, but to protect the doctors from lawyers like John Edwards who made millions off of a medical lawsuit that was ultimately based on junk-science. It is not that the docotrs milking the insurance companies but that the doctors are trying to prevent ambulance-chasing lawyers from milking the insurance companies. Tort reform would take care of this problem and Barack Obama made it clear that he has no intention of ever correcting that problem.

Of the people wihtout health care, the more accurate term is "people without health insurance." 47 million is the favorite number to quote. Of those, 12-20 million are illegal aliens who are simply sponging off the hard work of the legitimate American taxpayer. Many more are people who choose not to carry health insurance because they are young and healthy enough to go without it. (I was like that from age 18 to age 31.) the rest qualify for Mediaid and Medicare and no hosptial will turn anyone away from the Emergency Room.

As for you repeating of the Obama talking point that people who like there current health care can keep it, once again you need to look at the facts and actually read what is in HR3200.

Here is an example:

My wife owns a small business. Right now, she pays about $40,000/yr for healthc care benefits for her employees. If HR320 passes and becomes law, she has two choices: A) continue paying $40,000/yr of B) stop coverage of her employes and pay fines that total only $8,000 or $9,000 per year. Clearly, the most economical thing for her to do is stop coverage and pay the fines. Thus, al of her employees would be forced to fnd their own health care coverage, or enroll in the government's socialized plan.

Multiply my wife's small business by millions of small businesses across the United States, and you can see how millions of people are going to be forced off of their current private plans and onto the government's socialized system.

I believe the Dems designed it that way and then went out and sold the story of "keeping what you've got" to those who were willing to believe it without trying to find the truth.