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Record number of Britons go abroad for healthcare.

Comprehend

Comprehend

Res Ipsa Loquitur
Telegraph said:
Thousands of "health tourists" are going as far as India, Malaysia and South Africa for major operations – such is their despair over the quality of health services.

The first survey of Britons opting for treatment overseas shows that fears of hospital infections and frustration with NHS waiting lists are fuelling the increasing trend.

More than 70,000 Britons will have treatment abroad this year – a figure that is forecast to rise to almost 200,000 by the end of the decade....

...Andrew Lansley, the shadow health secretary, said the figures were a "terrible indictment" of government policies that were undermining the efforts of NHS staff to provide quality services.

The findings come amid further revelations about the Government's mishandling of NHS policies, and ahead of official statistics that will embarrass ministers:

• On Wednesday, figures are expected to show rising numbers of hospital infections. Cases of the superbug Clostridium difficile, which have risen five-fold in the past decade, are expected to increase beyond the 55,000 cases reported last year.

• On the same day, statistics will show that vast sums have been spent on pay, with GPs' earnings rising by more than 50 per cent in three years to an average of more than £110,000.

• New research shows that growing NHS bureaucracy has left nurses with little time to see patients – most spending long periods dealing with paperwork.

Katherine Murphy, of the Patients' Association, said the health tourism figures reflected shrinking public faith in the Government's handling of the NHS.

A Department of Health official said the number of patients seeking treatment abroad was a tiny fraction of the 13 million treated on the NHS each year. Waiting times had fallen. Almost half of patients were treated within 18 weeks of seeing a GP. Most people who had hospital care did not contract infections
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More bad news from the U.K. healthcare system.

The real staggering number is that it is expected to almost triple to 200,000 in just three years.

Supporters, how do you defend such information?


( I see how the Health official did, but when the number of people fleeing the free healthcare is expected to triple in 3 years, that speaks pretty loudly.)
 
Mike182

Mike182

Flaming Queer
Comprehend said:
More bad news from the U.K. healthcare system.

The real staggering number is that it is expected to almost triple to 200,000 in just three years.

Supporters, how do you defend such information?


( I see how the Health official did, but when the number of people fleeing the free healthcare is expected to triple in 3 years, that speaks pretty loudly.)
Click to expand...

supporters of what?
 
Fluffy

Fluffy

A fool
I don't care. I can't afford private healthcare nor foreign healthcare so I need the NHS no matter how crap it is.
 
Mike182

Mike182

Flaming Queer
Comprehend said:
Sorry.

Supporters of government healthcare.
Click to expand...

so you would say that high quality health care for those who can afford it is better than decent health care for all? even with the option on top of that for higher quality for those who can afford to pay? and yes, regardless of it's flaws, the UK NHS does provide decent health care.
 
Comprehend

Comprehend

Res Ipsa Loquitur
Mike182 said:
so you would say that high quality health care for those who can afford it is better than decent health care for all? even with the option on top of that for higher quality for those who can afford to pay? and yes, regardless of it's flaws, the UK NHS does provide decent health care.
Click to expand...

I would say that it doesn't have to be either/or.

You say that the NHS provides decent healthcare but just imagine how bad it must be for people to skip the healthcare that is local and that they have already paid for with taxes to take time off work (losing pay), travel to another country with all the associated costs, then pay for healthcare they already paid for in the UK.

I"ll tell you what, the healthcare would have to REALLY be bad for me to do that.
 
Booko

Booko

Deviled Hen
Comprehend said:
I would say that it doesn't have to be either/or.

You say that the NHS provides decent healthcare but just imagine how bad it must be for people to skip the healthcare that is local and that they have already paid for with taxes to take time off work (losing pay), travel to another country with all the associated costs, then pay for healthcare they already paid for in the UK.

I"ll tell you what, the healthcare would have to REALLY be bad for me to do that.
Click to expand...

And yet, you're more likely to survive a heart attack in the UK than the US.
 
Comprehend

Comprehend

Res Ipsa Loquitur
GeneCosta said:
Care to defend the hundreds of thousands of Americans crossing the Canadian border, then? Market power, after all.
Click to expand...


BTW - Supporters of socialized healthcare always cite the fact that Americans go abroad for perscriptions as a sign that there is a problem... (I agree with this)

...so, why is it not also a sign of a problem when the Brits leave? :shrug:
 
Smoke

Smoke

Done here.
Buttercup said:
Not just Canadian....I know people who go to Mexico (from California) to get dental care.
Click to expand...
A while back, Hugo Chávez offered to arrange with Cuban doctors for low-income Americans to have eye surgery. That would undoubtedly get you on some kind of government list you'd rather not be on, though.
 
Mathematician

Mathematician

Reason, and reason again
Comprehend said:
Actually, I am trying to discuss the state of the UK system... You seem more interested in talking about the US system. I bet there is a thread for that...
Click to expand...

Well, you continue to attack the UK system, and in other threads you speak against universal health care -- so it's pretty clear what your intentions are. :D
 
Comprehend

Comprehend

Res Ipsa Loquitur
GeneCosta said:
Well, you continue to attack the UK system, and in other threads you speak against universal health care -- so it's pretty clear what your intentions are. :D
Click to expand...

right.... my intention is to discuss socialized healthcare..... so why do you keep trying to drag the US into it?
 
mcteethinator

mcteethinator

Idiosyncratic Muslim
Comprehend, it's pretty obvious what you're doing. You're propagandizing against socialized healthcare but completely ignoring how capitalist healthcare is many times worse.
 
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