Why of why doesn’t Danny ever mention the elephant in the room?

Of course the NHS would have shorter waiting list if we spent 16% of GDP on health as the freedom loving Yanks do (instead of 9%).

NuLab HAVE tried to introduce markets – look at ISTCs, hardly a success are they?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/panorama/hi/front_page/newsid_8212000/8212960.stm

The comparison in healthcare costs is somewhat bogus. Americans over-pay for healthcare, thus subsidising the drug companies and their research to a massive extent. European countries drive a much harder bargain on drug prices because of collective bargaining power, but the drug companies still make money (and develop new drugs) because the Americans are pumping the cash in. Take away the American cash and who will make up the shortfall?

The optimal situation for British national healthcare is that the Americans carry on over-paying for theirs, since we benefit from them doing so.

That said, Hannan is equally ignorant and has proven himself, once again, to be nothing more than a politician on the make.

Fact-checking Dan Hannan could take all day.

Day? Lol try all week…

It’s not just pharma they overpay for Rob- it’s insurance costs, consultants fees, etc- none of these benefit us……

“16% of its GDP. We pay 8.4% of GDP”

And this is supposed to resemble less state interference? Are you being serious?

The only thing I will give this Tory prick credit for is he is honest. Unlike Call me Dave, Boris bear , and most of the shaddow cabinet who predtend that they love the NHS.

This guy speaks for the real Tory party and it is about time the public woke up and unserstand that the modern Tory party is just as mad as the Republican party.

I doubt he cares. I imagine he’s bored shitless as an MEP and realises he’s never going to make it big in politics. His no doubt fully aware of how helpful these interviews are (he also did one the other day attacking the Copenhagen summit) to his party’s election prospects. I predict in the short term he’s going to be a full-time troublemaker for Cameron until he’s finally slapped down and will monetise his inevitable martyrdom into a tv career in the US.

Using the fact that the train network has been privatised as part of his argument about privatising health services does seem a very odd move by Dan Hannan. I mean, imagine what an NHS that performed like our rail network would be like…

Far be it for me to defend what Dan says on here, but let’s get the idea of ‘fact-checking’ sorted.

Dan says “You know we’re not the worst in the developed world, but the United Kingdom does pretty badly”

So, to fact check Mr Painter checks him against ONE country, the US. Why not France, Germany, Spain, Holland, Singapore, Japan, Australia etc etc? Why only the United States, when even in the video Hannan says the US should change it’s system?

I’m sorry, but Dan is right that the UK does pretty poorly comparatively when you look at various health outcomes, survival rates etc. But you have to remember that he doesn’t support the UK going to a US model. There are more than two ways to administer health care.

Daniel Hannan speaks and argues very eloquently, in a way in which it is difficult to get angry with him.

His argument is perfectly sound if you were talking about watches, groceries, furniture etc etc. But when you come to the problem issues of climate change, healthcare and education, the market mechanisms he advocates for break down.

Indeed, if the market were such an optimal solution to the healthcare issue, I would expect that 90% of the world’s countries would be using US style system (of course without the government interventions in 30% or so of the market – medicare/medicaid).

The fact of the matter is Hannan argues (however soothingly) by anecdote and faith, rather than tried and tested empirical fact. I don’t think the guy’s nasty, it’s just used ideal assumptions in forming his argument, and thus he’s not thought it through.

“Indeed, if the market were such an optimal solution to the healthcare issue, I would expect that 90% of the world’s countries would be using US style system (of course without the government interventions in 30% or so of the market – medicare/medicaid).”

Or it might just be that doctors and drug manufacturers have proved to be a consistently effective interest group lobby in a great many countries. Professionals tend to have the skills to co-ordinate in a political context.

Incidentally, that figure about life expectancy includes a whole lot of other risk factors. Take out murder and car accidents, and Americans live on average one year longer than Brits rather than one year less.

Cunt.

[12] Good point on life expectancy. Hannan himself has commented on this in another of these videos where he says that, in terms of measuring health outcomes, what matters is your life expectancy after you have been diagnosed with an illness. So, things like 5 year cancer survival rates are a better indicator of health service outcomes than life expectancy.

[11] Charles – The thing about the market in healthcare is that it’s not your traditional market because keeping costs down isn’t your primary goal – you want your illness healed, and (assuming you have sufficient resources) you are prepared to pay more to get the service faster. Dan argues for very simple things (more patient choice, ability to use private money in addition to taxation, a continuation of state backed healthcare for the poor) but he is the only politician prepared to air his views, and because his views mean massive reform of the NHS, he is shouted down by lefties as someone who wants healthcare decided by wealth.

It is a great shame, because our country needs and deserves a real debate on healthcare provision but as soon as anyone comes up with an idea that changes slightly the state monopoly of the health provision they are told that they want to deny the poor access.

It is a great shame, because our country needs and deserves a real debate on healthcare provision but as soon as anyone comes up with an idea that changes slightly the state monopoly of the health provision they are told that they want to deny the poor access.

Quite so.

The state should ensure everyone has access.
The state should not be the monopoly provider of the service.

Why have so few other countries chosen to follow the NHS model?

[14] It is my impression that Danny really doesn’t understand health?

I mean what are his credentials in this sphere, has he ever tried to run a health organisation, for example, does he posses any clinical knowledge – I suspect not in either case?

Danny seems to be an ideologue and has convinced himself that a certain kind of business model can be applied to all forms of organised human endevour?

Trust the likes of Hannan at your peril – unless of course you belong to a privileged group in which case you might do rather well given how much emphasis Danny puts on convenience and consumerism instead of clinical need or fairness.

@14, 15

I was under the impression that the state didn’t have a monopoly on healthcare in this country – see BUPA AXA etc. People have the choice to go elsewhere, and some people do, it’s just that most people would rather stick with the NHS.

I’d like to echo Paul Sagar in that Hannan is a monstrous cunt.

Great to see Paul and Daniel honing ther highly tuned debating skills……

No point debating with idiots pagar whose ideas are patently false and destructive, speaking of which you keep ducking my request to clear up a nasty smear via email, which is fine as long as you don’t repeat it again.

No point debating with idiots whose ideas are patently false and destructive

Can’t agree.

If it is your view that an idea is false and destructive, you should be prepared to demonstrate that by argument and evidence. Name calling is a poor substitute for rational debate.

On that bombshell we’ll have to disagree, by arguing with patently false ideas you can give them mileage they would have long been denied.

Thankyou for proving my point. This is what a healthcare debate means in this country. One side says maybe we ought to have a debate, the other says shut up you cunt. Brilliant isn’t it?

Mark M:

No, you miss the point, which is that many of us do not take Hannan seriously as a knowledgeable voice on the NHS or one that reflects any thing like a broad base of opinion.

A discussion on the NHS is all well and good but Hannan, someone who wants to take the NHS apart, is not really a beacon of outstanding thought on the subject matter is he?

And this thread isn’t about an NHS discussion, it is about Hannan once again being used by some in the US a a false spokesman on the NHS in order to prevent reform in the United States.

[24] Well said, DHG.

Hannan is clearly an ideologue – who can forget his recent outing on Fox News when he gave such an unbalanced account of the NHS’s performance?
If he is so keen to kiss republican arse then I think he has to accept a bit of flak when he returns to his home in, err, Brussels.

Anyway, how can there ever be ‘debate’ with a politician who has ALREADY nailed his colours firmly to the (American) flag?

DHG

by arguing with patently false ideas you can give them mileage they would have long been denied.

Asserting that ideas are patently false but then not attempting to back up the assertion with data or argument is a form of intellectual fascism.

“You are wrong and and I am not going to tell you why that is as to do so might imply you could be right.”

By the way, please confirm that it really is you calling someone a “cunt” on this occasion as I don’t want to expose the shallowness of your thought process then discover I have been fooled by an imposter…..

pagar, Hannan’s ideas on the NHS have already been taken apart here, surely you’re not wanting a re-treading of that? And don’t start bandying around fascism this early in a discussion, it doesn’t bode well for it’s conclusion does it?

With regards to the use of the C-Word, I was merely echoing Paul Sagar on this one, the term seems fitting regarding my personal feelings about Hannan.

You don’t half pick rum allies pagar.

OK Pagar well how about this for evidence
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/339/aug04_2/b2732

The burgeoning move toward de-regulation and marketisation has hardly yielded benefits for elderly people in private care homes over the last 10-15 years.

Experiences in the United States and Australia have shown the lack of political will to promote the interests of residents against the interests of the industry and its shareholders.
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/323/7312/566

If Hannan is so keen on health markets why didn’t he tell the republican Fox audience about failings that have already occurred in the UK when care homes where taken over by entrepreneurs?

The problem with any rational discussion of the NHS is that it has been accorded “national treasure” status in the British psyche- along with the Spitfire, Yorkshire Pudding and Bruce Forsythe.

The problem is that it is not “free at the point of delivery”. Nothing of value is free. It may not be charged for at the point of delivery, but it has, nevertheless, to be paid for.

But, because it appears to be without cost, there is no disincentive to the individual taking advantage of the service and this, consequently, results in a massive waste of resources.

So, we have the outcome where we pay highly trained professionals hundreds of thousands of pounds to hand out prescriptions for anti-biotic and anti-depressant drugs to people that don’t need them and other highly trained professionals hundreds of thousands of pounds to put the pills in a box!

If we charged £5 for a consultation with a GP, the number of consultations would reduce by more than 50% and there would be no deterioration in the nation’s health.

Please don’t ask for evidence for any of the above- it’s a rant.

I just wanted to see how easy it was to impersonate DHG.

[29] Fake DHG

The GP consultation is an interesting one. Make any mention of charging to see a GP and you’re proclaimed a monster. Yet we do exactly the same in dentistry. £14.50 (or whatever it is these days) for a check up. It’s pretty much the only bit of the NHS I ever use and I pay at the point of use.

[24] Real DHG “Hannan, someone who wants to take the NHS apart”

Ok, so he wants fundamental reform of the health service. Is that such a bad thing? He repeats often that it should remain government backed for the poorest, and if you listen he doesn’t want us to move to a US style system. Can you expand on what you mean by ‘take the NHS apart’ and also explain why you think that is wrong? Let me repeat, Hannan still proposes state sponsored healthcare for the poor.

[30] Let me repeat, Hannan still proposes state sponsored healthcare for the poor.

A telling point?
Why does Danny want the State to look after this group – could it be because there are fewer juicy financial pickings amongst ‘the poor’?

Surely it’s not because he lacks faith in the market to deliver such a service?

Twat Pretending to Be Me:

Not grown up, or clever and the smiley face doesn’t hide the fact you’re a dick.

Mark M:

A health service just for the poor sounds like taking it apart to me? Universal healthcare is the aim here, not some piss poor version of America’s system and quite frankly, as I’ve said before, Hannan is not a great vice for reform, mainly because he hates the NHS so much, seems to like perpetuating myths about it and is generally not a fair and balanced voice of reason on the issue.

But this has already been said.

[31] a&e charge nurse
“Surely it’s not because he lacks faith in the market to deliver such a service?” – Frankly yes, that is pretty much the reason. But you also have to consider that the market cannot provide jobs for all either – that is why we have unemployment benefits. Just because the market has some failings doesn’t mean government can’t mitigate against them.

[32] DHG

He does not propose any version of America’s system, piss poor or otherwise. He proposes a system where the money is in the hands of the user (in other words, the money is controlled neither by the state nor large insurance firms), and rich or poor have access to the same system. In the video he mentions the privatisation of the railways and this is actually quite a good point. If you consider the railway service, rich or poor can both buy a ticket on the same train. Now, a rich man has the ability to buy a first class ticket. “Unfair on the poor man” you might say, “why can’t he have the first class service too?”. But if you cancelled all first class carriages and made the whole train the same, the quality of the standard class service would suffer as the availability of first class influences both services available and quality of service throughout the whole train.

In healthcare this means that the argument is the market delivers a 5-star service for some and a 4-star service for the rest, as opposed to universal healthcare where the lack of competition provides a 3-star service for all. Yes, with a market you get that variability in service and yes, those with money will get the best service. The argument is that such varying standards are a price worth paying for a better overall quality of healthcare.

I have to disagree about Hannan being a great vice for reform. If you’re having a real debate then you want the reform side to be argued by someone who wants to see fundamental changes. Hannan certainly wants those changes and he has his own ideas about how the system ought to work. What you need is someone on the other side who is passionate about the NHS and can argue that the status quo represents the best health system, and will do so with statistics and reasoning.

Mark M:

I don’t buy your arguments, free market good for some bits of a national health service, but not for others, when in reality, we only have to look at nations with large scale privatised medicine, like the US for example where Hannan is trolling his wears and we can see how badly it fails everyone.

Also, he does not implicitly propose an American system but his time spent over there and furthering the cause of what is a broken American healthcare system doesn’t bode well, thankfully, his views are not supported by the vast majority of British people.

And you’ll never convince me that the private sector should be anywhere near healthcare, there is no profit in health as far as I am concerned and a search for profit will only have negative impact upon the user, just as privatisation of other essential services has had I’m afraid.

[33] “Surely it’s not because he lacks faith in the market to deliver such a service?” – Frankly yes, that is pretty much the reason.

Care to say why, Mark?

My guess would be there is little cash to be made from those with schizophrenia, or degenerative neurological conditions, say?

Look at where business already intersects with health in the UK.
It targets the worried well – or patients with a single pathology (like a dodgy hip) because it is far easier to set up a profitable production line.
Staggeringly non-NHS providers can’t even get this right.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/oct/21/scotland-nhs-profit-treatment-centres

[34] DHG

Although I don’t have figures to hand, I highly doubt the US healthcare system “fails everyone”. Of course it’s not perfect, that’s why they’re having the debate, but our health service is far from perfect as well. Like I say though, and it’s clearly worth repeating, Hannan neither implicitly nor explicitly wants the Uk to adopt the US system. Mind, would you not say though, that despite his obvious anti-NHS feelings, that the amount of time he spends in the US means he is probably in a better position to comment on the US health system than us?

Also I couldn’t disagree more about the private sector being near the health service. Think of the advances in medical technology that have come from pharmaceutical companies. With no private sector involvement we wouldn’t have the kind of easy access to such as wide variety of basic drugs as we currently enjoy. Think of the amount of choice you have on offer in your local supermarket if you have a headache. Now add in popping into Boots and the selection on offer in the pharmacy should you need something stronger. I don’t see how a search for profit in this area of healthcare has resulted in a negative impact upon the user.

[35] I wouldn’t care to say why actually. I don’t want to put words in his mouth and I have no idea of the treatment required for those conditions nor whether private sector practice would be suitable/profitable. Leaving aside whether the private sector can set up systems to deal with multiple pathologies, what is wrong with an extension of these single issue ‘production lines’ (presumably the technical expression would be specialist clinics)? Why not take as much of the potentially profitable stuff out of the NHS and open it up to competition, and the consumer benefits that brings, while leaving in the stuff that the private sector doesn’t much want (maternity and A&E are the two frequently cited to me)?

Mark M:

The consistent failures of the American healthcare service and its poor comparison to the NHS have long been dealt with here and elsewhere.

Hannan, when it comes to the NHS, is at the fringes of his own party, never mind with regards to how the people of Britain feel.

His idea of a healthcare service is very similar to the current American model, not the same but inspired by, which is odd considering how badly it is failing, aside that is from the government run bits which are far more efficient than there private sector bedfellows.

The fact is, you are re-treading right-wing talking points over here which have long been dismissed, for instance to pin the medical advances on the private sector, which is not completely true, many advances happen also in the public sector R&D, seemingly forgetting how costly medicine is in the US and how the pharmaceutical industry has done all in its power to hold back healthcare reform to hold onto its crucial profits.

There is no profit in healthcare, the fact that many nations have strived to do so sums up the deeply flawed thinking of free-market economics.

It quite simply doesn’t work.

[37] Well I think we can safely say we disagree, but it’s been a fun debate. I guess we’ve gone as far as we can on each side.

I have to say I’m glad I’m going over right-wing talking points. I like to think of myself as right-wing but every so often it’s nice to be reminded I’ve not slipped over

Also it’s good to see an online debate can happen without a slanging match, so thankyou for that.

N.B. I’m not conceding. I just don’t think we’re going to go any further without repeating myself

Yes, we disagree, rather polar opposites on this issue and no doubt many more, esp. regarding the Hannan.

Cunt. Twat. Fuck. Twat. Cunt. Racist. Twat. Homophobe.

There we go, easy to impersonate DHG.

The US healthcare system is ridiculously expensive and potentially troublingly inegalitarian. But the poorest in the US often end up with a better service than the average individual gets from the NHS in the UK.

Nick, I think you’re plucking statements out of thin air on this one.

Nice to see my fan club is in full effect.