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May 07, 2007
Bleak House 2007
by Peter Pitts
For those pols and pundits who think that we need a health care system "just like Europe," some harsh reality from the other side of the Pond.
The Observer (one of the leading liberal-left newspapers in Europe) reports that British doctors will take the historic step of admitting for the first time that many health treatments will be rationed in the future because the NHS cannot cope with spiraling demand from patients.
In a major report, the British Medical Association will warn that patients face a bleak future because they will increasingly be denied treatments. The BMA will urge the NHS to be much more explicit about what it can realistically afford to do and ask political leaders to engage in an open, honest debate about rationing.
Dr Michael Wilks, one of the BMA's senior office holders, revealed the organization’s radical thinking in a recent letter to its 139,000 members updating them on the progress of the BMA working group. He told them the group had concluded that '"hile the service should remain universal, the challenges raise questions about how comprehensive the service can continue to be. This will depend on whether politicians and the taxpayer are prepared to contemplate either increasing expenditure or explicit rationing."
Here's a link to the Observer article:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,2073633,00.html
Posted by peterpitts at May 7, 2007 12:06 PM
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