Patients ‘should not expect NHS to save their life if it costs too much’

 

I believe NICE was once, The National Institute for Clinical Excellence.  Just remembered it.  Interesting it’s now Guidelines but still called NICE.

1. Socialism at work. Though saying that I know Americans who can’t afford medical treatment. The trouble is we are all getting too old and medicine costs too much!

   Posted by LyndonB       08/13/2008  at  07:55 PM  



2. This is a golden example of why I feel healthcare should never, EVER be a government program. It quickly becomes a ‘no-win situation’.
   Medicine nowadays is becoming nothing short of miraculous. Pretty much the only reason why someone *can’t* be saved anymore is because “we couldn’t get to him in time.” The questions thus become not whether ________ can be accomplished, but rather a) cost, and b) quality of life afterwards. I don’t know about any of you, but I personally have no desire to spend my last days (or worse, last years) leashed to a few million dollars worth of machinery. That’s not living, by my definition. And yet if healthcare is government run, then logically that is precisely what the government takes responsibility to do. If the means exist to save someone’s life, AT WHATEVER COST, and it is not done, it is the government’s fault as they are the ones who chose to be responsible for healthcare.

   I have no problem with the concept of *giving* time and money to feed the hungry and heal the sick and etc. But tax money that goes to government isn’t given, it is TAKEN. You don’t have the option to decide that you are responsible for your own health and to therefore opt out of the system and its bills. If you did, it would be up to YOU to decide whether the chemotherapy, the interferon, the dialysis, the ________ was worth it to keep you alive. If so, no problem, it’s your money. If not, again no problem, it’s your life. But I use those 3 as examples because people *who themselves need those treatments* are deciding THEIR OWN LIVES are not worth what they must go through to keep them. Maybe not the majority of patients, but enough that no healthcare provider is surprised by the refusal anymore. And as long as it’s their money and their life, there is no reason not to respect the patient’s decision.
   But once the state has taken over, the patient has no authority, over the money or over their life either one. It becomes effectively a straw poll to see if __________ politician’s career will be enhanced or damaged by letting you live or letting you die.

   The patient’s life has become valueless except as a means to gain political advantage.

   The public’s money has become valueless except as a means to gain political advantage.

   The state officials’ integrity has gone from being priceless, something that cannot be sold, to something with no value whatsoever beyond what the highest bidder will offer. And shortly integrity becomes TRULY valueless, as the value of integrity depends on the belief of others that one’s integrity is not for sale. Once that perception dies entirely, the value of integrity dies with it.

   All downside, no upside.

   No thanks, keep the change.

   Posted by GrumpyOldFart       08/14/2008  at  11:03 AM  

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