it's major failings are political interference, inability of clinicians to see past their own noses, annual budgets, dead-mans-shoe recruitment/promotion policies and GP's feathering their nests.
+ 1
Not surprised at kimbers post either.
Kimbers you should add those MPs who have visited their GPs, that would be equally helpful.
Knowing (to an extent) some of those listed, the links are tenuous at best in many cases. People worked at JP Morgan * or Odey or Landsdowne. Knock me down. Privatisation Pirates the lot of them.
* given bLair's salary at JPM, does that mean he is the most guilty of them all. Ba*****! 😉
This comes highly recommended for those who want a serious read on the issue: http://www.dannydorling.org/books/unequalhealth/
One of the problem's with OP's graph (plus those like it on gapminder) and the debate about the US is scale. Averaging for an entire country is meaningless in the context of healthcare provision where we find massive differences in life expectancy from one part of a city to another: http://life.mappinglondon.co.uk
And prenatal care and childbirth is not usually included.
That really shocked me - $20k I was told to have a child 😯
But I do agree with the post above, the US is an awful example. The question really should be how it compares with say France or Germany. FWIW, having dealt with one of those for a relative, I wouldn't say that it was great - the amount of bureaucracy is incredible when you're used to going to an NHS doctor and then a specialist as necessary without having to fill in forms.
As an aside my wife was doing clinical experience last week using ultrasound as a diagnostic tool for non pregnancy issues. It is really cheap to do and quick non invasive and risk free. The alternative ways of seeing inside the body are not. She asked why there is not much American literature on such a useful procedure , the reason they don't do it in America because you can bill more for the alternatives.
In any profit driven health care there will be a risk that the prime function will be profit making not service delivery.
I don't think we should be reducing healthcare to statistics and the bottom line.
For me it is more about the sort of society I want to live in. That is a society that will gives universal healthcare free at the point of use to its members and where the services are provided by publicly owned or non profit organisations.
I think that's fair comment in some ways but the numbers do have to be discussed. Healthcare costs are going up (as we live longer and can cure more health issues but often with more expensive drugs/treatments) and it needs to be funded in some way (because oft touted efficiency savings will never amount to anything significant).
I would happily pay more tax (within reason) to ensure a continued free at poi service but many wouldn't. Without discussing the costs or what will be delivered, it'll never happen because so many are misinformed about how relatively well the NHS does in terms of costs compared to other countries.
