So does the UK have lower rates of colon cancer Tolstoy? Does the UK conduct more colonoscopies per capita than the United States? What medical testing prevents lung cancer and prostrate cancer?

Maniac, so you can opt out of NHS taxation, and instead buy your insurance?

Is life expectancy determined simply by the healthcare system?

I remember an article that determined if you eliminate gunshot deaths and traffic fatalities that the United States life expectancy exceeds European countries because they do not allow massive gun ownership or drive the miles that average Americans do.

eMac "Maniac, so you can opt out of NHS taxation, and instead buy your insurance?" - yes you can emigrate.

Life expectancy is only an indicators as to how good / bad a system is.

At the end of the day healthcare is just like baked beans. Some people prefer the best at 35p per can and others are grateful that they can buy beans at 8p per can. Neither consumer is wrong, they just have different perspectives.

It is very difficult to compare healthcare systems, because so many factors are at play. I don't think it is possible to declare one or another a disaster, at least in the developed world.

eMac - "I remember an article that determined if you eliminate gunshot deaths and traffic fatalities that the United States life expectancy exceeds European countries because they do not allow massive gun ownership or drive the miles that average Americans do."

I remember reading somewhere that if my aunt had balls she'd be my uncle.

Arguably, the diabetes rates have jack to do with the healthcare systems and more to do with a generally healthier lifestyle. Diabetes is not a disease you "catch". It is a condition you get through genetics combined with either poor eating and exercise habits or as a result of other conditions like hypothyroidism.

Maniac, so you posted a complete fabrication. Anyone who doesn't want to take part in the disaster know as the NHS has to buy health insurance twice. Funny thing is more people immigrate from the United Kingdom to the United States than vice versa.

Funny how when the facts don't agree with the rhetoric the obfuscations flow.

Primary care can do a lot to lead people to engage in healthier lifestyles, though. I'm much more apt to change my diet and exercise more if I go to the doctor and shows me x,y, and z tests showing bad indicators that can be changed through a more optimal regime of diet & exercise, and showing me the consequences of not changing.

So you say.

Don't see any evidence of it presented.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0749379704001035

That's an abstract.

Here is a link to the article. FYI
http://hmcrc.srph.tamhsc.edu/Enewsletters/February%202008/Goldstein%20et%20al%20MRFI%20AmJPM%202004.pdf

eMac "Don't see any evidence of it presented." Funny how you ask others for evidence yet you rely on articles you think you remember reading.

If you think the NHS is a disaster because you can't opt out of paying taxes that support it, they tell me can Americans opt out of paying their taxes to support universal health care? Thought not.

In the US you pay taxes to provide basic health care to everyone. In the US you can then buy health insurance if you wish and can afford it.

In the UK you pay taxes to provide a better than basic health care service to everyone. In the UK you can then buy health insurance if you wish and can afford it.

Calling one a disaster whilst claiming the other is perfect is crazy.

Cancer death rates per 100,000
United Kingdom 137
United States 123.8
So after all the excuses dismissing the survivor rate in the United States, all the claims that the UK prevents cancer better, the bottom line is if you are British you stand a worse chance of death from cancer than in the United States. The argument that everyone in the United Kingdom is better off because of the NHS proves false again. What is the next unsubstantiated claim from the prisoners of the NHS.
http://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/cause-of-death/all-cancers/by-country/

Maniac, I guess you don't realize that the United States doesn't have universal health care to opt out of. Do you deal in reality often? You need to read up on Obamacare. You won't though. Facts get in your way.

One thing I would specifically point out is that in the US system, hospitals often pay two or three times more for EXACTLY THE SAME drugs compared to what a UK hospital would pay for THAT EXACT PILL. That's one of the key points in the video I posted. That's not an issue of whether one system provides better care than the other, it's just a clear example that the US system is not managed as well, resulting in hospitals (and therefore patients, their insurers, and the government) being ripped off by over-charging pharmaceutical and medical supplies companies.

It was already acknowledged that the survival rate is better. However, the incidence rate of cancer is higher in the US.

NHS watchdog refuses to pay for lung cancer drug that is twice as effective as chemo and could benefit 1,000 patients a year. The NHS doesn't care if you die.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2299655/NHS-watchdog-refuses-pay-lung-cancer-drug-Crizotinib-thats-twice-effective-chemotherapy.

Professor Mike Rawlins, the chairman of Nice, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence recommended that the NHS should not pay for Avastin, a drug for those suffering from bowel cancer. Nice accepts that Avastin can lengthen the lives of some patients: it just doesn’t think it’s worth what it costs.

The NHS doesn't think it is cost effective for you to live.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2299655/NHS-watchdog-refuses-pay-lung-cancer-drug-Crizotinib-thats-twice-effective-chemotherapy.html

JRK, what an illogical line of reasoning, you celebrate fewer people get cancer even though more people die of it

It would be optimal if people got it less frequently and if they did get it, died less frequently. I'm simply saying that the different systems have different strengths. Please acknowledge this.

Emac

please do not quote the Daily Mail - it is the the newspaper equivalent of citing Fox News. It has an anti-NHS, strong right bias, and had terrible science/health journalism.

Perhaps the attached link (to Cancer Research UK) might help. It certainly suggests that the breast cancer figures are much closer (24 per 100k in the UK, 19 in the US), and provides a reason on just why the prostate cancer rates look so bad (over-diagnosis of non-lethal prostate cancer in the US).

http://scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/2009/08/17/we-need-to-be-careful-when-comparing-us-and-uk-cancer-care/

Not saying the NHS couldn't be better, but it is nowhere near the disaster you proclaim. Indeed the WHO comparison (which ranked France #1, and the US #37) put the UK at #18.

And NICE have a unenviable job - they have to balance the efficacy of any treatment against the cost. The NHS does not have an unlimited budget. The last link suggests that £32000 worth of Avastin will provide 8 months of life. £4000 of chemo averages 4 months. Is another £28k to get 4 months (on average) delay of the cancer cost effective? I don't know, but you can see why this is a very complex area.

JRK, although I am an advocate of more attention to preventive medicine (e.g. vaccines instead of long-term hospitalizations for disease), cancer is rather difficult to prevent medically. Causes of cancer are environment and genetics, there isn't a magic pill to completely eradicate all chance of cancer. So although different systems do have different strengths, such as a higher priority on preventive medicine, you can't really use cancer as an argument for it.

Again JRK your argument is illogical. It would be optimal if people "lived."
Pete U, please read the thread if you are going to jump in the middle of it. The premise stated by Jaime was the US Medical system is "poor." Now if the US medical system is "poor" the evidence in the thread proved the NHS is a total fucking disaster. I didn't set the premise of the thread. As far as your "Fox News" analogy I would submit that citing the NHS or other socialized medical sources is no different. If you can prove an individual article's premise, conclusion, or methodology inaccurate do so. Claiming "my source is better than your source" is about as schoolyard as one can get.

"It was already acknowledged that the survival rate is better. However, the incidence rate of cancer is higher in the US. "

So, if they detect you have cancer, you will die in the UK compared to the US. There is only one cancer I know if with a prevention method (all others are detection only) and that is either Ovarian or Uterin which women under 25 have an innoculation for. So, even *with* earlier detection, you are still mroe likely to die from your cancer in the Uk than in the US. That actually proves that the UK system is far worse *despite* the claimed better preventitive care. And preventitive care doesn't reduce the occurences of cancer except in the case of women under 25.