Paul, as I said in an earlier comment, the early 90s was probably the worst period in the history of the NHS, deliberately starved of funding by a government that didn’t really believe in the system but didn’t propose any real alternative to replace it.
The cynic in me thinks that they were just trying to turn public opinion against the NHS so that they could turn around and say ‘you see, we told you that government always messes things up’.
I’m sure that some lay people do not keep up to date with every advance in medical science, that is their choice but many people are actively interested in their own healthcare and make demands of GPs to see x or y specialist for a or b treatment.
I still don’t really understand how, if as people are claiming, Americans take more interest in their own health and treatment and that treatment is better and more responsive when they do get it, they still die younger, infant mortality is higher etc. Something doesn’t add up somewhere along the line.
