January 18, 2011
Wake up Congress! UK to open up health care system to competition
Posted by Staff
Fox News reports:
British Prime Minister David Cameron says he plans to open up the National Health Service to competition.
Cameron's plans to shake up Britain’s universal health care system-- known as NHS -- will transfer much decision making authority to general practitioners, and thus bypassing administrators to cut out bureaucracy.
“We need modernization on both sides of the equation," he said in a major speech defending public sector reforms. "Modernization to do something about the demand for public health service, and modernization to make the supply of health care more efficient, which is about opening up the system, making it more competitive, cutting out waste and bureaucracy.” According to Cameron, it’s not, in these times of austerity, that “we can’t afford to modernize. It’s that we can’t afford not to modernize.”
Skeptics are already accusing him of taking a “wrecking ball” to one of the finest institutions in the country. Some doctors, nurses and union leaders wrote a letter to the editor of the London Times. Among the concerns expressed, was that bringing in competition could mean bringing down quality, because, doctors would, presumably, go for the cheapest service options in order to save money
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