If people drink too much, take drugs, engage in risky activities, or become enormously fat, goes the argument, then they shouldn't qualify for NHS treatment and they should be left to their own devices. If their behaviour leads to severe medical conditions, they should be left to seek treatment at their own expense and not expect the taxpayer to step in and sort them out.
Well, apart from the fact that the NHS has always pledged to be free at the point of use, regardless of personal circumstances and regardless of financial status, deciding that certain people shouldn't qualify for NHS treatment would be the start of a slippery slope. Once you begin turning away certain individuals, where would it end? The exemptions would proliferate until whole swathes of people could no longer use the NHS.
Furthermore, if people happen to have engrained psychological weaknesses that have led to illness - lack of self-control, recklessness, impulsiveness, whatever - why should be penalised for it? They may have tried many times to change their behaviour and failed. Or their behaviour might be a response to distressing personal circumstances they find it hard to cope with. People don't simply "make themselves ill".
Another case of engaging mouth without engaging brain.
NB: Of course all this only applies to the NHS because health care is organised quite differently in the States.
Nick, we as doctors would always help persons who are in need for whatever treatment Maybe it's a very small pourcentage suffering under the Münchhausen syndrom, but in general health problems have their reason. The food industry fills the market with unhealthy products to make easy money and when people have not much money to spend ,chips and sugar drinks are welcome. Drinking , smoking , drugs bring enormous amounts of money to the producers and not all persons can regulate their lives. Saïd had a surgeon friend who operated under drugs and he was not the only .
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Hannah: Indeed, how would you decide that someone had made themselves ill, when all sorts of things could have been the cause, like ultra-processed ready meals or air pollution or exposure to industrial toxins.
DeleteIt would be difficult to prove that a person’s habits caused their illness, besides smoking = lung cancer. Although here, you do get a discount on your health insurance premiums for being a non smoker.
ReplyDeleteThe real issue to me is that if a person is a taxpayer (no healthcare is “free”) then they have the right to that healthcare that they are contributing to.
Bijoux: Exactly, as I said to Hannah, how would you decide that someone's personal habits are to blame? And yes, we all pay for health care so we should all be entitled to receive it.
DeleteSo you have them in your country, too. Unfortunately, they are not few here. They also, for the most part, claim themselves to be "Christians". The glaring hypocrisy.
ReplyDeleteSandra: Yes, how does refusing people medical treatment square with "Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another" (Ephesians 4:32)
DeleteSuch a glib way of thinking....societal pressures can be a root cause of illness....poverty leading to unhealthy food as that is all that can be afforded, poor housing leading to respiratory problems, heavy work in poor conditions...
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