KeithWith respect I'm not sure how old you are, but I paid Insurance from 1950, out out of my pittance of a wage as an apprentice. We were told that this entitled us to all free services, medicine, hospital, dentists, glasses etc. Great play was made of the fact that it was "free". I know there are as you say "no such things as free services" as such, because we pay for it before we get it! Labour, or as they have now rebranded themselves as "New Labour" which really means Conservative in reality, and were the first to charge for prescriptions, If my memory serves me right, this was for a prescription, I dont know who changed it to per item.I'm sure this will bring out some rude comments from the "liberal leftie luvvies" who post on here, but we cannot sustain the NHS in the way we are allowing the abuses to continue. Anybody who comes into the country (legally) can get free health care, nothing wrong with that, but look below, is that fair, when we are denying life preserving drugs and treatment to ALL our own residents. Extract courtesy of the TIMES ON LINE Health CorrespondentsHealth tourists may deny NHS patients kidneysSarah-Kate Templeton, Health Correspondent The information, released under the Freedom of Information Act, shows that one hospital is spending up to £1m a year on dialysis for nearly 40 non-British residents; another has placed two asylum seekers on its waiting list for transplants and a third has recovered only 2% of its costs from overseas patients.In the last financial year St George’s hospital in south London spent about £100,000 on dialysis for overseas patients but has recovered only £2,100.Timothy Statham, chief executive of The National Kidney Federation, said: “Capacity is at breaking point,” he said. “We have very ill British] patients needing to dialyse through the night because there is not sufficient capacity. Some patients may come from abroad because dialysis was not available in their country. We seem to be offering a world health service.”a) Are you happy to continue this apparent abuse?b) Are you happy to pay for it/them?Can we discuss this without the usual cry of "racism" it's too big a subject and ought to be commented on based on the facts.Remember what I have quoted is only the tip of the iceberg!
w John Michael Atkinson ● 6637d