Posted on 01/26/2008 10:45:53 PM PST by bruinbirdman
Doctors are calling for NHS treatment to be withheld from patients who are too old or who lead unhealthy lives.
Smokers, heavy drinkers, the obese and the elderly should be barred from receiving some operations, according to doctors, with most saying the health service cannot afford to provide free care to everyone.
Fertility treatment and "social" abortions are also on the list of procedures that many doctors say should not be funded by the state.
The findings of a survey conducted by Doctor magazine sparked a fierce row last night, with the British Medical Association and campaign groups describing the recommendations from family and hospital doctors as "outrageous" and "disgraceful".
About one in 10 hospitals already deny some surgery to obese patients and smokers, with restrictions most common in hospitals battling debt.
Managers defend the policies because of the higher risk of complications on the operating table for unfit patients. But critics believe that patients are being denied care simply to save money.
The Government announced plans last week to offer fat people cash incentives to diet and exercise as part of a desperate strategy to steer Britain off a course that will otherwise see half the population dangerously overweight by 2050.
Obesity costs the British taxpayer £7 billion a year. Overweight people are more likely to contract diabetes, cancer and heart disease, and to require replacement joints or stomach-stapling operations.
Meanwhile, £1.7 billion is spent treating diseases caused by smoking, such as lung cancer, bronchitis and emphysema, with a similar sum spent by the NHS on alcohol problems. Cases of cirrhosis have tripled over the past decade.
Among the survey of 870 family and hospital doctors, almost 60 per cent said the NHS could not provide full healthcare to everyone and that some individuals should pay for services.
One in three said that elderly patients should not be given free treatment if it were unlikely to do them good for long. Half thought that smokers should be denied a heart bypass, while a quarter believed that the obese should be denied hip replacements.
Tony Calland, chairman of the BMA's ethics committee, said it would be "outrageous" to limit care on age grounds. Age Concern called the doctors' views "disgraceful".
Gordon Brown promised this month that a new NHS constitution would set out people's "responsibilities" as well as their rights, a move interpreted as meaning restrictions on patients who bring health problems on themselves. The only sanction threatened so far, however, is to send patients to the bottom of the waiting list if they miss appointments.
The survey found that medical professionals wanted to go much further in denying care to patients who do not look after their bodies.
Ninety-four per cent said that an alcoholic who refused to stop drinking should not be allowed a liver transplant, while one in five said taxpayers should not pay for "social abortions" and fertility treatment.
Paul Mason, a GP in Portland, Dorset, said there were good clinical reasons for denying surgery to some patients. "The issue is: how much responsibility do people take for their health?" he said.
"If an alcoholic is going to drink themselves to death then that is really sad, but if he gets the liver transplant that is denied to someone else who could have got the chance of life then that is a tragedy." He said the case of George Best, who drank himself to death in 2005, three years after a liver transplant, had damaged the argument that drinkers deserved a second chance.
However, Roger Williams, who carried out the 2002 transplant on the former footballer, said doctors could never be sure if an alcoholic would return to drinking, although most would expect a detailed psychological assessment of patients, who would be required to abstain for six months before surgery.
Prof Williams said: "Less than five per cent of alcoholics who have a transplant return to serious drinking. George was one of them. It is actually a pretty successful rate. I think the judgment these doctors are making is nothing to do with the clinical reasons for limiting such operations and purely a moral decision."
Katherine Murphy, from the Patients' Association, said it would be wrong to deny treatment because of a "lifestyle" factor. "The decision taken by the doctor has to be the best clinical one, and it has to be taken individually. It is morally wrong to deny care on any other grounds," she said.
Responding to the survey's findings on the treatment of the elderly, Dr Calland, of the BMA, said: "If a patient of 90 needs a hip operation they should get one. Yes, they might peg out any time, but it's not our job to play God."
Ping...
Health care is for the young and healthy
Coming soon, to a nation near you! Be the first on your block to die from an untreated illness or injury due to Hillarycare!
The U.K. reserved section of Hell is going to have to be expanded.
Isn’t socialism wonderful?
Just think, we helped save them from the Nazis yet some of them are turning into those same Nazis.
I was thinking close to the very same phrase!
I need to send my ex wife over there....... I’ll tell her they have free healthcare.
No treatment for the frail elderly? At least it is “free”!
You get your money’s worth in the UK.
One way!
Pathetic isn’t it....using the same logic, if the car blows a tire, just get rid of the car...how soon they forget the terrible lessons of ethnic cleansing that we fought WW II for and the Cold War to protect the Soviet satellite countries, and Bosnia and several African countries and even today in their own country there are some who want to replace the Brit infidels with people of their own...Shame on them..
Isn't that how they originally pushed it? Free health care for everyone?
Surely somebody else must remember when this was predicted.
^
Surely someone is listening to this but not the AMA, they’re running commercials about how sad it is that everyone isn’t insured. They obviously don’t understand that under universal care their salaries are going way down.
At the age of 61 your life was over, you were put in a crematorium and vital elements of your body were extracted and you were burned to death.
Welcome to "Hillary Care!" IF that ever happens here, it would exclude 50% or more of Americans. I'm surprised they didn't include the disabled too.
Yes, that predates the debate I was thinking of.
They deny certain people care that their taxes have paid for over a lifetime.
the elderly and sick are those who need medical care...
This is disgusting.
Long time ago my Dad told me stories about how the brit fleet treated the remains of their dead sailors with utter disregard, leaving body parts strewn around on decks even as they towed them into US shipyards for repairs from fights in the north atlantic convoys.
Of course the ship workers refused to board until it was cleaned up...
Conservatives take note — THIS is what we are going to get if Hillary or Obama become president. A Dem president with a Dem Congress will force nationalized healthcare on us.
thanks, bfl
Are smokers, fat people and the aged excempted from paying taxes then?
Abortion is elective surgery and should be paid for by the user. Abortion is not done because of an illness or injury.
Fertility programs may raise different questions
Mel
“One in three said that elderly patients should not be given free treatment if it were unlikely to do them good for long. Half thought that smokers should be denied a heart bypass, while a quarter believed that the obese should be denied hip replacements. “
Let them suffer and die — the cruelty of people is mind boggling. How are they different from the Nazis?
I should point out that this survey was a survey of DOCTORS!!!!
“Among the survey of 870 family and hospital doctors, almost 60 per cent said the NHS could not provide full healthcare to everyone and that some individuals should pay for services.
One in three said that elderly patients should not be given free treatment if it were unlikely to do them good for long. Half thought that smokers should be denied a heart bypass, while a quarter believed that the obese should be denied hip replacements. “
They must be getting advice from that ex Colorado governor guy. What's his name Governor Lamb to the Slaughter?
yitbos
So that's how Mrs. Toon is going to make it affordable!
yitbos
“Universal” Healthcare.
Now it’s merit based instead of coverage based.
This is what happens when you give government control over health care.
They can’t afford to treat everyone, so they will pick and choose who gets to live and who has to die.
How better for government to keep people in line?
Do you think there would be market for health insurance for those over 65 if Medicare were phased out?
Watch for Oxygen Credits....
If she only insures healthy people then her plan will work. Of course, the group they exclude will still be needing medical care. Or do they plan to let those people die when they get sick? Who knows, before long they might eliminate all sick and elderly people.
I moved to the UK a year ago and couldn’t believe the health care. It is almost like a 3rd world country. It amazes me to see a movie like Sicko and the constant drum beat from the media telling us government health care is the answer. How can they have any credibility? Clearly, it is the answer for the government to take that one big step in controlling people’s lives, because after they own health, personal freedom and responsibility isn’t a part of the equation. Every public policy and tax is rolled out to drive social policy as it affects health care and thus public finances.
I was at dinner with the Secretary of State of Health during a function, he told a story of a 71 year old man in his constituency who had been in line for cataract surgery for 15 years, he formally requested that his son of 50 years of age could take his place in line as he had a similar ailment. In my one year, I could fill up a page with health horror stories. They have a “bug” that kills lots of people here because the hospitals are too dirty; many people won’t go to the hospital as it is more dangerous than living with their health problems. The number of Brits that take “medical holidays” is exploding; they visit India / South Africa / Pakistan / Australia for surgery. Add to this that dentistry is also covered by the NHS; the last survey showed that 1 in 5 Brits had to do their own work on their teeth because of the poor service. Yes, the Brits actually pull their own teeth instead of going private (if private is available in some places).
But, as the government also owns the press, they constantly tell the public that somehow they are “better people” for sacrificing their health to this endeavor. In fact, even NHS does survey’s find very few people are happy about their health care, but they are very proud to sacrifice themselves as it makes them noble. It is really strange.
FR bookmark
. . . ( “here it comes!” )
One in three (Doctors) said that elderly patients should not be given free treatment if it were unlikely to do them good for long.
Yes it sounds callous but it is simply necessary in a system where you are required to provide service to anyone who requests it regardless of need or available resources.
This would be true of any type of service. Eventually some type of rationing becomes absolutely necessary. When demand is unlimited but resources are not absent the constraints of market forces rationing is inevitable.
In a socialist healthcare system someone will have to make decisions on who receives the expensive to provide procedures because the supply is limited and the demand is not. Gordon Brown seems to have become aware of this fact.
Rationed Health Care. Coming soon to a neighborhood near you.
PING
Picking and choosing who lives and who dies. Big Brother hard at work.
As the money dries up new rules are written, so there's time for the disabled to be heaped onto the dead carts as well. Give em time.
So what the Brits are paying taxes for is so that some nameless, faceless, unaccountable bureaucrat, and VERY probably a lefty (since they're the political power over there) to boot, is going to determine who lives and who dies.
Anyone care to bet that they'll eventually decide that the right-wingers are most of the ones who should be denied treatment???
This article furthers my conclusion that some in Britain have completely lost their soul.....and mind. How can one society be so cold to their fellow man? It’s frightening that such pronouncements should come from those who are, or once were, considered healers.
Coming soon to a neighborhood near you.
But it is for the children and the common good.
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