… Justin Webb on yesterday’s Radio Five Drive show, being interviewed about Kate Couric, new CBS news anchor. He spoke about how the big networks were losing market share to cable and the internet.
“There ate three groups of people who don’t watch the evening news any more, and they are intelligent people, young people, and right-wing people – and obviously there are some people who fall into all three categories – at least (laughs) arguably – so right-wing people tend to watch Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News, intelligent people tend to not bother with the telly at all, and young people get their news from the internet where they get it at all.”
I wonder what happened to the American left ? I suppose that’s synonymous with intelligent.
If anyone wants to listen, it’s here for a week (Wednesday’s show, 2h53m in).
The BBC is really giving huge prominence to the allegations by Seymour Hersh about Bush wanting to attack Iraq.
Happened already…..2003 !!
Rick,
It’s harder to avoid the extortion funded treatment rationing service than extortion funded entertainment channels, however that just makes me try harder.
Because I take full responsibility for my own health, I make sure I’m in good health.
Rick
That was a simple error. I meant Iran, of course. The BBC kicked off with the Seymour Hersh stuff about Bush bombing Iran on the World service overnight, then started on Radio 4 as the main 5.30am headline followed by full court press on the Today prog including the main 8.10am slot. No UK newspaper had this as a lead – except the Guardian !
having given up on “Today”, i presume the 8:10 slot never once asked what would be wrong with NOT bombing Iran in order to stop the genocidal aims of Ah Mah Dinner Jacket?
It’s harder to avoid the extortion funded treatment rationing service
Having paid insure premia for health care in Germany and the US I can assure you it is a very cheap deal for healthcare in Britain – it would bankrupt a lot of employers to pay the rates that German and US business pays………..
Rick,
No it means we all get a more meagre ration of treatment.
Rob AND Rick
Also we are paying among the highest indirect taxes in the world. The ordinary people do not have enough spare cash to have any type of LIFE and pay health insurance as well.
I would love to have health insurance, but Im buggered if im going to pay 3 times for it.
The trouble with health care is universal coverage. That is what costs the money. The most expensive patients are women; as such German private health insurance charges 50% higher premia for women over men since it is actuarially sound.
The highest costs are incurred in the last 6 months of life. So it is really the very old, again mainly women; those who get pregnant, and those with children who cost most.
The cheapest people to insure are single men who do not drink or smoke and die shortly before retirement. Smokers tend to die unhealthy with breathing problems and heart problems.
It is interesting that a woman gets a contraceptive pill on prescription – no VAT, but a man pays 17.5% VAT on condoms.
So if you exclude people with a) chronic conditions b) heavy users of healthcare you could speed up the whole process and cut costs by only treating the occasionally sick rather than the chronically or frequently sick.
The American system does this by capping cover, not paying for screening, and excluding 45 million from coverage.
No country has a successful healthcare system – France is bankrupt, Germany is looking to reform along UK lines, the US looks at Canada for cheaper drugs, and Britain looks everywhere for dreams. Only two countries in the world produce a surplus of doctors – Cuba and Estonia – yet Britain will have lots of unemployed doctors as from 2007.
All governments are desperately trying to get out of healthcare costs and push liability onto the individual, same with pensions – but they will not forego the revenues.
There is no easy way on health – noone could afford to insure for full coverage – the costs would be huge and noone really considers just how huge. Insurance companies cannot even pay out on endowments or pensions why should we trust them to pay out on a serious operation ?
It would be better if doctors installed Visa machines in each surgery and charged everyone £50 to see a GP just so they got the flavour of things – the poor could claim it back.
Then you could say put a £500 deposit before being admitted to hospital or £1200 cash when entering a maternity ward – I have seen demands for cash in German hospitals when admitting a non-German for emergency operation.
There are problems with the NHS and people working inside know most of them; but there is no wonderful system elsewhere. Being told you cannot have an operation for a sick child who will die otherwise because the insurance company will not pay is not so much better; or to know that someone will take a punt on an operation if you pay $50.000 personally is no joy either.
33% bankruptcies in the USA are a result of medical bills. The British are remarkably penny-pinching and have no idea of the real cost of healthcare. They are truly innumerate.
I doubt many have ever read the BUPA policies their employers want to dump; that pregnancy is not covered nor emergency.
The trouble withthe NHS is that Labour fiddled the numbers, they decided how money would be spent – on Diversity Directors, IT Projects, PFI Bids (which the NHS has to underwrite), and privatisations – last week the NHS Logistics supply organisation was privatised to a US company)
The great thing about the NHS is that the public knows zilch about what is going on. They get a few news stories but miss the big theme. It is costing money to privatise the NHS and privatisation is moving really fast under Labour.
Community nurses will be privatised and they don’t know who they will be working for; PFI involves privatising hospital buildings and land and selling off extra land. It is really funny that the public is so ignorant of which US companies are busy negotiating deals or that a Texan is in the Dept of Health setting up contracts.
The Government intends to make NHS an insurance provider with contracts with hospital chains or care providers – the new GP contract calls then “contractors” not doctors and gives the Sexcretary of State the power to transfer the contract to “other providers”. Patient records can be transferred anywhere without consultation if the Secretary of State decides – and when they are computerised (and non of you have opted out) they can be ported to India or the US for processing and research at drug companies.
I have to laugh at how stuck in the past people really are about the NHS. They are still stuck in the 1970s when the organisation is being stripped down to be re-modelled as a US HMO along the lines of Kaiser Permanente.
So Rob and Gary you will get your chance to pay insurance, but probably when you are old. Take a look at German pensioners and how high their premia are –
Rick,
Privatising the NHS is an excellent idea. The problem is that I will still be paying taxes for this useless treatment rationing scheme, when I [sh/c]ould be saving it for my own health.
The NHS will never work.
US HMO along the lines of Kaiser Permanente
What is wrong with Kaiser? It actually works pretty well most of the time, and it delivers care very efficiently for not that much money(relatively speaking). Not very personal though. The relentless efficiency is a bit disconcerting, but I guess that’s how they keep the costs down. You also have to take responsibility for your own healthcare — no one is going to send you postcards saying “It’s time for your annual colon cancer screen.” You have to remember to ask for those things yourself.
The one I use is spotlessly clean; you could eat off the floors (not that I would want to.)
I wonder why the US government doesn’t simply trash programs like Medicaid (which is horribly expensive, fraught with inefficiency and fraud, and doesn’t even cover all medically needy people), and just buy the poor and working poor people Kaiser memberships.