What do we think of the NHS?
Posted Thursday 15 October 2009 ~ 12:52pm
Brian's halo begins to show as he praises the NHS
Colin gets his point across
The autumn session of Ethics through the Drinking Glass kicked off for the autumn with a lively and entertaining debate on the National Health Service led by Dr Brian Magowan.
Brian did his [now familiar] schizophrenic act presenting first the case for the NHS and all the good it does – you can’t get a better system anywhere, available to all responsive treatment and dedicated doctors and nurses – and then [moving to another chair was Dr Brian Magowan2] who told us the system was inefficient, costly and was out of step with the United States and other European countries in not charging those who could afford it for the levels of treatment they require.
The talk that followed was vigorous and animated. The health reforms by Barak Obama were gone over with approval, people told of their personal experiences, we discussed how health care in financial terms is a bottomless cup always able to use up more funding; the pressure on hospitals to perform to government criteria (often born of a need to respond to media attention rather than to address the needs of patients); and debate about the usefulness – or total lack of it- of middle management layers of bureaucracy in hospitals. We agreed that the service provides life enhancing surgeries as well as life saving operations.
All felt the better for coming out and joining in. There was a unanimous vote in favour of the NHS at the end of the evening.
Categories: Groups, Ethics through the Drinking Glass