The NHS is behaving like a spurned and angry lover. It tells a woman who is dying of cancer that if she has drugs that it refuses to pay for but which she herself will pay for, then she is unwelcome. She can no longer have free NHS care. Never mind that, like the rest of us, she has paid her taxes for a lifetime. It is as if she was unfaithful to the NHS and her lack of love and devotion should be punished by total rejection.
What a perversion this is of the welfare state. How horrified would be Attlee and Beveridge and others who had the dream of excellent healthcare provision for all.
The psychology of the NHS decision to abandon those who are so insulting as to pay for some better drugs is a fascinating subject. I guess the reason the NHS feels so bitter towards those who pay for better drugs is the implication that the drugs supplied by the NHS are not good enough. This, of course, is true. But the NHS cannot bear the truth to be pointed out or to accept it. So it wishes to punish those who assert it. This is the psychology, perhaps, not of the jealous lover but the spoilt, vain, self-centred child who cares nothing for the actual well-being of others.
The actions of the NHS are immoral and I hope they will prove to be illegal, too.
Here is the beginning of the story in today's Sunday Times:
A woman dying of cancer was denied free National Health Service treatment in her final months because she had paid privately for a drug to try to prolong her life.Linda O’Boyle was told that as she had paid for private treatment she was banned from free NHS care.
She is believed to have been the first patient to die after fighting for the right to top up NHS treatment with a privately purchased cancer medicine that the health service refused to provide.
News of her death at the age of 64 has emerged as six other patients launch a legal action to trigger a test case that they hope would force the NHS to allow them to top up their care with private drugs.
The full story is here.
Posted by James Bartholomew • Indexed in NHS
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She was strangely naive.
She should have just bought the drug and not told anyone.
Posted by: fjfjfj at June 6, 2008 09:48 AM
I had a similar situation (but less serious than cancer) happen to me back in 1995. I was losing weight and in agony with stomach pains. I went to a private gastrologist. This is what he told me.:
Either I could pay privatly for ALL tests and hospital treatment. It would cost thousands. Or I could do it ALL on the NHS and wait AGES for the tests and hospital beds. That would be free and there was a huge waiting list.
I was not allowed to pay for half to speed things up and heal my agony. I left the UK the year after. Why does it take so long for such a stupid system and state of affairs to get to the newspapers?
Posted by: rachel at June 14, 2008 12:04 PM
It is rather more complicated - as Unity points out, it wasn't a question of paying for the drug and keeping quiet - the drug involved would have needed some very expensive monitoring.
"They want the NHS to put up £6,000 per month in treatments, which they would have ot have alongside the Avastin for it to have any effect, to enable them to pay out a further £4,000 a month for drug that may or may not extend their lives by a bit, although by how much (on average) no one actually knows for sure..."
Posted by: Tony P at July 17, 2008 12:58 AM
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Who are they to forbid co-payment anyway?
http://tinyurl.com/6md43k
Whose NHS do they think it is?
(By the way, I can't post a comment using Firefox, the fixed width comment window that opens there is too narrow.)
Posted by: John Page at June 2, 2008 12:48 PM