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clovehitchedWord of this is getting around - apparently in order to discredit the, as I understand it ,somewhat limited reforms that President Obama is proposing for the US's very expensive, and not all that effective health care system, right wing pundits in the US have been using the NHS as a scare story about all the bad things that can happen under "socialised medicine". The problem is, they're not being overly accurate about their claims, with perhaps the most priceless example being this massive goof about Stephen Hawking, where it was claimed, by one publication, that he would have had no chance for survival had he been British.
Apparently the writer of the article in question didn't realise that Stephen Hawking is, in fact, British, and has been the recipient of quite a lot of NHS care. The article was hastily rewritten to remove any mention of Professor Hawking, but the Internet noticed and the epic LULZ are now spreading.
The Guardian (yes, I know) has noticed too, and if you feel like grabbing some popcorn the comments thread here makes for a wonderful piece of "can't stop looking at the car crash" style Internet browsing.
Anyway, I want to make a personal point. When I was eight years old I was walking home from school one day. I was crossing the road at the centre of this Google Maps page from north to south, to walk into the lane running south, which was part of my walk home. The school gates had those zig zag yellow "School, No Parking" lines on them, which were being duly ignored by the parents picking up my schoolmates. There was no pavement on the south side, so I had no choice but to cross there, and an illegally parked truck (I even remember whose parent it was parked there) was blocking my view along the road.
I edged out to look round, and at that moment I'm told someone stepped out from one of the garden gates on the opposite side. A car which was travelling along the road swerved to avoid them, and narrowly missed the truck I was peering out from round.
I experienced this as a screeching of brakes, at which point I guess I must have had a ton of adrenaline dumped into my system. Time slowed down, and I turned to face the sound. The world streaked across my vision, as if shot with a poor quality video camera with too much persistence, and I heard a bang. The lateral streaks of the world became a swirl, and in slow motion I watched the swirl as I turned upside down, and then felt a sharp pain as my left knee struck the asphalt. The swirl continued as I came to rest on my back, pretty much back where I'd started crossing the road, and then time returned to normal speed.
As it did, I felt a pain more intense than anything I've ever experienced in my stomach - far more pain than an eight year old should have to deal with. I looked up to see a circle of faces looking down at me. The events of the next 15 minutes are confused in my memory - someone ran home to get my mother, someone else came from across the street saying, "I've called an ambulance". Others were exclaiming that I was alive. Someone, perhaps the car driver, got me a blanket and laid me on it. My mother arrived in tears - I found myself consoling her (ah, irony). One of my teachers arrived and with my mother picked me up to move me back inside the school (I don't think this is recommended practice). As they did, the weight of my legs hanging below me made the pain intolerably worse, and I'm not quite sure how I managed to avoid passing out.
In due course an ambulance arrived. It took my to the Chesterfield Royal Hospital where I spent a week on the Nightingale Children's ward in a lot of pain, being fed through an IV line in my arm, feeling deeply sorry for myself. When it was clear that I didn't need to be hospitalised any longer, a week later (when I was able to eat food again and get out of bed), they allowed my parents to take me home. I spent several more weeks off school before returning, having made a full recovery. By some miracle I had "escaped" the impact of the car with "only" haemorrhaging into my stomach, despite the initial fears that my ribcage was smashed, that my lungs were punctured, that I might die. I guess I would have done without medical attention.
The car driver sent me a jigsaw in hospital - I understand he was really cut up about what had happened. It wasn't his fault - it was just one of those things.
Through all of this there were no insurance companies involved, nobody ever asked how the x-rays, the doctors, the medicine, the bed, etc. were to be paid for, no questions were ever asked about whether we had "coverage", they just sent an ambulance, took me into hospital, looked after me for a week, and got me back in a fit state to be sent home. When I was eight years old the system the US right wing wants to portray as some kind of socialist dystopian disaster simply did its job and saved my life.
So yeah, thanks for that NHS, and don't believe everything you see on the television, especially if there are political lobbyists involved.
Originally posted at http://auntysarah.dreamwidth.org/207629.html - you can comment here or there.
Apparently the writer of the article in question didn't realise that Stephen Hawking is, in fact, British, and has been the recipient of quite a lot of NHS care. The article was hastily rewritten to remove any mention of Professor Hawking, but the Internet noticed and the epic LULZ are now spreading.
The Guardian (yes, I know) has noticed too, and if you feel like grabbing some popcorn the comments thread here makes for a wonderful piece of "can't stop looking at the car crash" style Internet browsing.
Anyway, I want to make a personal point. When I was eight years old I was walking home from school one day. I was crossing the road at the centre of this Google Maps page from north to south, to walk into the lane running south, which was part of my walk home. The school gates had those zig zag yellow "School, No Parking" lines on them, which were being duly ignored by the parents picking up my schoolmates. There was no pavement on the south side, so I had no choice but to cross there, and an illegally parked truck (I even remember whose parent it was parked there) was blocking my view along the road.
I edged out to look round, and at that moment I'm told someone stepped out from one of the garden gates on the opposite side. A car which was travelling along the road swerved to avoid them, and narrowly missed the truck I was peering out from round.
I experienced this as a screeching of brakes, at which point I guess I must have had a ton of adrenaline dumped into my system. Time slowed down, and I turned to face the sound. The world streaked across my vision, as if shot with a poor quality video camera with too much persistence, and I heard a bang. The lateral streaks of the world became a swirl, and in slow motion I watched the swirl as I turned upside down, and then felt a sharp pain as my left knee struck the asphalt. The swirl continued as I came to rest on my back, pretty much back where I'd started crossing the road, and then time returned to normal speed.
As it did, I felt a pain more intense than anything I've ever experienced in my stomach - far more pain than an eight year old should have to deal with. I looked up to see a circle of faces looking down at me. The events of the next 15 minutes are confused in my memory - someone ran home to get my mother, someone else came from across the street saying, "I've called an ambulance". Others were exclaiming that I was alive. Someone, perhaps the car driver, got me a blanket and laid me on it. My mother arrived in tears - I found myself consoling her (ah, irony). One of my teachers arrived and with my mother picked me up to move me back inside the school (I don't think this is recommended practice). As they did, the weight of my legs hanging below me made the pain intolerably worse, and I'm not quite sure how I managed to avoid passing out.
In due course an ambulance arrived. It took my to the Chesterfield Royal Hospital where I spent a week on the Nightingale Children's ward in a lot of pain, being fed through an IV line in my arm, feeling deeply sorry for myself. When it was clear that I didn't need to be hospitalised any longer, a week later (when I was able to eat food again and get out of bed), they allowed my parents to take me home. I spent several more weeks off school before returning, having made a full recovery. By some miracle I had "escaped" the impact of the car with "only" haemorrhaging into my stomach, despite the initial fears that my ribcage was smashed, that my lungs were punctured, that I might die. I guess I would have done without medical attention.
The car driver sent me a jigsaw in hospital - I understand he was really cut up about what had happened. It wasn't his fault - it was just one of those things.
Through all of this there were no insurance companies involved, nobody ever asked how the x-rays, the doctors, the medicine, the bed, etc. were to be paid for, no questions were ever asked about whether we had "coverage", they just sent an ambulance, took me into hospital, looked after me for a week, and got me back in a fit state to be sent home. When I was eight years old the system the US right wing wants to portray as some kind of socialist dystopian disaster simply did its job and saved my life.
So yeah, thanks for that NHS, and don't believe everything you see on the television, especially if there are political lobbyists involved.
Originally posted at http://auntysarah.dreamwidth.org/207629.html - you can comment here or there.
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no subject
Date: 2009-08-12 11:27 pm (UTC)At the heart of it, it's the self-serving misdeeds of the doctors and managers inside the NHS (and politicians outside) that are the only problem with the NHS. And like they've never suffered professional bastardry in the U.S. *rolls eyes*