Brits consider going back to some fee for service

[r3020]

When I said this is what would happen when health care was "free" I was practical thrown from this board for being so stupid. I was ask who would go to the doctor just because they enjoy it. Take a good hard look at the future of health care in this country.

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The NHS can’t go on like this. Patients today – baby boomers, especially – bother the doctor with minor complaints when their grandparents would have grinned and borne it, and have unrealistic expectations of what the health service can provide. The system is at breaking point. The solution? We are going to have to start paying for some medical services at the point of delivery.

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There’s another factor that would have deterred patients from bothering the doctor with minor complaints in the pre-NHS age: cost. If you have to pay even a modest amount for a service, it changes your attitude. You value it. If medicine’s given for nothing, then inevitably it will be taken for granted. If this isn’t true, why do so many patients still casually miss GPs’ appointments without cancelling them (costing the NHS £600 million, according to this paper in 2009)?

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/andrewmcfbrown/100191628/the-nhs-cant-go-on-being-free-if-selfish-...

[GoredHusker]

It already happens here.  When I was on the local hospital board, a question came up of who frequented the hospital most often.  Over 70 percent of those that frequented the hospital for care were those on medicaid.  The remainder were on medicare, but one would expect older folks to need more care.  I don't see this changing with Obamacare, but on the other hand it wouldn't have changed without Obamacare.  It's human nature to waste things that are either free or deemed cheap.  I read an article a year or so ago describing the costs of electricity in different European countries.  France has some of the cheapest electricity over there, but per capita spends roughly the same as most other countries because they use a lot more of it per person.