Sunday 30 January 2011

In which I say something nice about the NHS

I frequently get my ear bent about my bitter disdain for the NHS and it's certainly true that I have been exceptionally unlucky not to encounter (as a patient) a single one of the caring, helpful staff that the NHS is said to be full of.

So, let me say something positive about British healthcare professionals: given the insane bureaucracy and meddling, soundbite-driven, target-oriented micromanagement by the government, given the complete disconnect of normal market self-interest in making medical people care about patient loyalty, it is a remarkable testament to the skill, dedication and commitment of those healthcare staff who do actually care and do actually deliver, that the UK is not at the bottom of the healthcare charts.

It just frustrates me that if there were truly an open market in healthcare, things would be so much better, people wouldn't be beholden to faceless quangocrats for the drugs they need, or have postcode lotteries, or have faceless bureaucrats unaccountably cutting services for everyone but the really rich.

So, here's to the individual nurses, doctors and other people in the NHS who care enough to deliver good health care despite, not because of, the stupid business model that the NHS has.

And could someone please arrange that my local GP practice gets a couple of them? Thanks!

9 comments:

Oleuanna said...

Are there any good working eamples of open healthcare anywhere?

Obnoxio The Clown said...

"Are there any examples of ANY market free from government interference?"

Oleuanna said...

No flipping chance....well maybe for a couple of years in Somalia a couple of years back...but that tends to get over shadowed by their pirate model... ;o/

monkey said...

my faith in the NHS was lost when i found both my grandparents lying in their own shit unable to do anything about it, I’m just glad that the last few days of my grandmothers life was spent in private care where she was treated like a human being

Anonymous said...

My doctor thinks I'm a cunt. He's right, but so is he.

If I turn up with joint pain, we both know it's nothing to do with my smoking. It's also nothing to do with my failure to adhere to Government drinking guidelines. I am a middle-class, middle-aged man whose body is getting older and squeaks a bit.

Yet he asks the same tired old questions. How many cigarettes? 40 (I lie - about 15). How many units of alcohol per week? 120 (I lie - 60).

And I get a lecture and my Voltaren.

Heaven forfend that I get an appointment in the early morning or late afternoon, for these times are reserved for people who don't work. I pay for something that I cannot use.

So I drag my painful arms around, ignore the mole which has become darker, put off having this growth on my abdomen looked at.

My bird is a nurse in an NHS ward. The quality of the nurses is quite variable. Get over to the Barbican one graduation day and play spot the Briton. There is no incentive to excel - promotion is with time served.

As far as quacks are concerned, why do we let them regulate the number of people who can study their discipline? Why don't we let an entrepreneur create his own medical university, pumping out as many sawbones as the market, both here and overseas, will absorb?

Tim Almond said...

The problem with the NHS isn't the good, hard-working nurses who go the extra mile. It's that it's run by clueless bureaucrats who also let a load of useless cunts remain in a job, or piss money away on all the wrong things.

And that's a far higher cost than the cost of giving evil capitalists some profits.

I hope to god that this government gets this push on GP budgeting going, because the sooner the public see what they can get for their money over the NHS, the better. People are going to be like "WTF? You mean this costs the same as the shitty fucking NHS hospital?"

And if you're a good nurse or doctor in the NHS then you have absolutely nothing to fear from privatisation. It's your lazy fucking co-worker who's going to get shitcanned.

sixtypoundsaweekcleaner said...

CallmeDave really should have got rid of the Biased Broadcasting Corporation on day one of his tenure in No.10. Their propaganda, bias and downright lies causes one to want to puke into one's cornflakes every morning.

Anonymous said...

Why do you need you GP practice to have a couple of them? Thats very unprofessional and probably against the law.

Just Woke Up said...

Obo said - "Are there any examples of ANY market free from government interference?"

The black market
The drug trade
Sex slavery
Money laundering
Issuance of ever more counterfeit fiat currency by BofE

I get your point though and am tending toward an Austrian school model of econ where Govt is much reduced and the rest of us can get about our lives with less regulation, less taxation, less snooping, less fucking security, and only then we can then start to rebuild this country and create the jobs everyone is clammering for. Oh and get us the fuck out of the EUSSR and let us compete again on the world stage!