Stephen Hawking defends the NHS..

[Popeye]

Well, I think I'll take the distinguished Dr Hawking's word, over that of IBD or any politician that is financed by the insurance and pharmaceutical industries.

Professor Stephen Hawking has spoken out in defence of the NHS after high-level U.S. politicians have branded the National Health Service 'evil' and 'Orwellian'.

The British professor, who has suffered from Lou Gehrig's disease for 40 years, insisted that he 'would not be here' were it not for the NHS.

He spoke after an editorial in Investor's Business Daily, a national financial newspaper in the U.S. that also runs articles by columnists on the Left and the Right, launched a misinformed attack on the NHS.

In an editorial commenting on the healthcare debate that has gripped America this summer, the newspaper claimed: ' People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn't have a chance in the UK, where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless.'

However Professor Hawking- who as recently as April was treated in an NHS hospital, Addenbrooke's hospital in Cambridge - quickly rubbished the claim.

'I wouldn’t be here today if it were not for the NHS,' he told the Guardian. I have received a large amount of high-quality treatment without which I would not have survived.'

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...evil-Orwellian-high-level-US-politicians.html

 

[GenSeneca]

Why is this relevant? I thought we weren't trying to model our system after the British model... Are you now suggesting that we are, or should, adopt a single payer system like that of Britain?

NHS debt threatens services

NHS managers have warned they may have to cut services to balance budgets, despite a watchdog's call for them to control spending better.

A report from an Audit Commission report reviewing NHS finances over the last year said they must improve their ability to control their budgets.

But managers said increased pressures meant they will have to cut services if they are to rein back spending, and the implementation of key areas of government health policy will have to be postponed.

The NHS Confederation, which represents hospital trusts and health authorities, said this was already happening in many parts of the UK.

£640m debts

The Audit Commission report says recent figures show the NHS in England and Wales faces debts of more than £0.5bn.

Two years ago the NHS in England and Wales faced a cumulative deficit of £409m.

Last year that rose to more than £541m, and forecasts suggest that by next year the health service will be more than £640m in the red.

More than a third of all hospitals are in debt, as are 80% of all health authorities.

Single payer leads to higher costs, ever growing debts, a reduction of services and rationing of care... But who cares about facts when there's a Progressive Utopian world of next Tuesday to be built?

 

[bododie]

Yes, Stephen Hawkings is just your normal street brain too. Come up with statistics where Joe Blow the kid who has ALS, In England, with National Health Care, gets the same treatment as Hawkings and this might matter.

 

[r0beph]

The reason Stephen Hawking is even in the news about this is because some right wing nutter decided to say:

People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn't have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless. {1}

Of course implying that a British citizen and professor at one of the leading UK universities wasn't even from England and didn't have to deal with the NHS is nonsense, but that doesn't stop anyone from saying it.

He came out to explain the facts that the original quote sort of ignored, that's why he's defending it.

{1} the quote which originally appeared in the Investor's Business Daily has been removed after Stephen Hawking came out and said he was born in the UK and NHS did pay for his treatment.

 

[GenSeneca]

some right wing nutter

Who?

I could comb through the Left Wing Nutter blogs and come up with all kinds of factually inaccurate claims and purely lunatic fringe statements.

The updated article has interesting insight into Obamacare's "end of life" provisions:

One of the Obama administration's top medical care advisers is Oxford- and Harvard-educated bioethicist Ezekiel Emanuel. Yes, he's the brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and has the ear of his brother and the president.

"Calls for changing physician training and culture are perennial and usually ignored," he wrote last June in the Journal of the American Medical Association. "However, the progression in end-of-life care mentality from 'do everything' to more palliative care shows that change in physician norms and practices is possible." - IBD

Palliative care is any form of medical care or treatment that concentrates on reducing the severity of disease symptoms, rather than striving to halt, delay, or reverse progression of the disease itself or provide a cure.

How many of you Welfare Statists would prefer your own doctor to issue "Palliative care" rather than 'do everything' to make you well?

 

[r0beph]

Who?

I could comb through the Left Wing Nutter blogs and come up with all kinds of factually inaccurate claims and purely lunatic fringe statements.

The updated article has interesting insight into Obamacare's "end of life" provisions:

It is a nation newspaper (originally called Investor's Daily) with a readership of 850,000 nationwide. It hardly can be called "a blog".

You'll rarely see me point out an unimportant blogger of either left or right lean. I hardly consider them relevant, either to anything I'm saying for or con; sort of like your strawman "blogger" remark.

Palliative care is any form of medical care or treatment that concentrates on reducing the severity of disease symptoms, rather than striving to halt, delay, or reverse progression of the disease itself or provide a cure.

How many of you Welfare Statists would prefer your own doctor to issue "Palliative care" rather than 'do everything' to make you well?

Again context is very VERY key. palliative care is the ONLY care, for example, for Type I IDDM (Diabetes), there is no cure to provide, you can only continue to treat. This is true for ALL terminal and incurable diseases. Do I prefer they give me palliative care? yes, I do, that's why I'm alive and why I've been alive for the past 20 years since I was diagnosed. Now mind you, this provision does not address research into currently non-existant cures, this only covers application of what exists. Regardless of how you spin it, the facts remain the same.

 

[GenSeneca]

It is a nation newspaper (originally called Investor's Daily) with a readership of 850,000 nationwide. It hardly can be called "a blog".

So you admit that you have no idea who authored the editorial... you just know it was some "right wing nutter".

Again context is very VERY key. palliative care is the ONLY care, for example, for Type I IDDM (Diabetes), there is no cure to provide, you can only continue to treat.

You're the one pulling a whirling dervish act...

The definition clearly states that Palliative care seeks to treat the symptoms of a disease RATHER THAN "striving to halt, delay, or reverse progression of the disease itself or provide a cure."

Spin away whirling dervish, spin away!

 

[r0beph]

So you admit that you have no idea who authored the editorial... you just know it was some "right wing nutter".

It was a reporter for a nationally recognized news source. I'm not sure who wrote it because they didn't feel like telling me.
http://74.125.113.132/search?q=cach...com&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a

You're the one pulling a whirling dervish act...

The definition clearly states that Palliative care seeks to treat the symptoms of a disease RATHER THAN "striving to halt, delay, or reverse progression of the disease itself or provide a cure."

Spin away whirling dervish, spin away!

You're ignoring the facts I've already gone over. You cannot halt, delay, or reverse type I diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, sickle cell anemia, or cystic fibrosis. Mind you the definition is very distinct. "The disease itself," does not refer to the symptomatic effects of the disease which are treated.

My sugar goes up when I eat and don't take insulin, so I take insulin to treat this symptom of my diabetes, of course there is no way to make my body produce insulin, so what do you call this type of care given the definition that is provided? It is absolutely palliative care, palliative care is the ONLY care.

With sickle cell anemia, a genetic disorder, you can't fix the production of rigid RBCs in the sufferer. It cannot be cured, a cure does not exist. Do you suggest that palliative care, which absolutely increases the sufferers QOL and increases life span, not be provided?

The problem you suffer from here is the lack of technical rendering of the definition. The "instead of" does not mean "in place of" it means "as opposed to" which can (and does) reference the lack of curative measures. I'm spinning nothing, it is simply your lack of understanding of the pliability of the English language and when to apply strict definitions to words.

 

[GenSeneca]

You're ignoring the facts I've already gone over. You cannot halt, delay, or reverse type I diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, sickle cell anemia, or cystic fibrosis.

You're the one ignoring facts, if Palliative Care only applied to such incurable diseases, then why would the definition state that Palliative care seeks to treat symptoms of the disease RATHER THAN striving to halt, delay, or reverse progression of the disease itself or provide a cure?

You can't answer that without spin, try not to get dizzy.

 

[r0beph]

You're the one ignoring facts, if Palliative Care only applied to such incurable diseases, then why would the definition state that Palliative care seeks to treat symptoms of the disease RATHER THAN striving to halt, delay, or reverse progression of the disease itself or provide a cure?

You can't answer that without spin, try not to get dizzy.

Let me use it in a sentence as we learned to do back in grade school:

"We have no cure for this disease, so we will treat the symptoms rather than cure the disease." See, not so scary and used JUST as it was in the definition.

Mind you, the definition does not state that palliative care is ONLY applied to incurable diseases, I never made this assertion. Only that the intent behind the majority of contemporary palliative care scenarios are incurable and chronic diseases. I'm not trying to sway you, it is as it is. When all this is said and done, you'll see. Until then you can continue to post your cute images and argue the definition of words that are well grounded in contemporary medical lingo.

To assume that this means that they'll not try to cure disease even if they have a cure is ridiculous as there is zero context for that assumption. The language used is as such "Palliative" because that is the technical term for what they're talking about.

Not really many other ways to say it, to be quite honest. And you can't exactly accuse me of spin, since I'm using the definition as I know it, not only from the definition you linked but my 5 years of working in EMS, where acute palliative care is an everyday action and palliative care for chronic disease is often seen and heard.

 

[GenSeneca]

Mind you, the definition does not state that palliative care is ONLY applied to incurable diseases, I never made this assertion.

Nah... You just implied it by using it only in the context of incurable diseases.

Until then you can continue to post your cute images and argue the definition of words that are well grounded in contemporary medical lingo.

Don't be jealous of my image library.

It was you who was arguing the definition of the word but now you have stopped spinning and admitted that it doesn't apply only to incurable diseases. Had you done that from the start, there would have been no debate on the definition.

To assume that this means that they'll not try to cure disease even if they have a cure is ridiculous as there is zero context for that assumption.

You just love being wrong...

QALY:

The quality-adjusted life year (QALY) is a measure of disease burden, including both the quality and the quantity of life lived. It is used in assessing the value for money of a medical intervention. The QALY model requires utility independent, risk neutral, and constant proportional tradeoff behaviour.

The QALY is used in cost-utility analysis to calculate the ratio of cost to QALYs saved for a particular health care intervention. This is then used to allocate healthcare resources, with an intervention with a lower cost to QALY saved ratio being preferred over an intervention with a higher ratio. This method is controversial because it means that some people will not receive treatment as it is calculated that cost of the intervention is not warranted by the benefit to their quality of life. However, its supporters argue that since health care resources are inevitably limited, this method enables them to be allocated in the way that is most beneficial to society.

That is the standard used by your single payer systems in the Progressive World of Next Tuesday.

 

[r0beph]

Nah... You just implied it by using it only in the context of incurable diseases.

no, I am still insisting that in the language of the bill it refers to exactly that.

Don't be jealous of my image library.

Not jealous, it's just childish, distracting, and wasting my bandwidth.

It was you who was arguing the definition of the word but now you have stopped spinning and admitted that it doesn't apply only to incurable diseases. Had you done that from the start, there would have been no debate on the definition.

Again, as far as the health care bill is concerned that is what it means.

It is only mentioned one time in the bill.

"An explanation by the practitioner of the continuum of end-of-life services and supports available, including palliative care and hospice, and benefits for such services and supports that are available under this title"

In this context where it is mentioned it refers to people who have DECIDED THEMSELVES to speak to support services for end of life care. The senior MAKES this decision themselves and this is NEVER chosen or forced upon, it is granted upon request and ASSURED to be granted by this language. What happens here is that the doctor who is speaking to them in a support fashion discusses end of life (since there is no cure assumed for either terminal illness or old age that led to the decision of end-of-life healthcare consultation) palliative care as well as other services.

This context fits 100% with my definition inference that you are arguing against.

You just love being wrong...

I know.

That is the standard used by your corporate insurers that weight qaly with your ability to continue paying premiums that will exceed their payout

Hey, I fixed that for you.

 

[Dr.Who]

So does the NHS in the UK deny care to people it deems less worthy. I suspect the article was alluding to the pre-born who have disabilities.

According to this:

http://prolife.org.uk/science-and-technology-committee-abortion-inquiry/

"The UK legislates in favour of equality between disabled and non-disabled persons at all levels except in respect of the pre-born disabled."

Which would make both the editorial and Hawkings partly right. Hawkings got great care because he was born. Had be been in utero he would have paid Charon's fare.

 

[Greco]

What you wingnuts chose to ignore is the FACT that the editorial was another Republican lie and they got outted for it. It's really just that simple.

 

[Dr.Who]

I did not read the article originally since a source was not provided. But I have found the article and read it now. It does not talk about preborns but it is about the elderly.

The author was saying that the system in the UK that assigns a point value to a person's life is bad. These are his exact words:


This is a relevant part of the article:

"The controlling of medical costs in countries such as Britain through rationing, and the health consequences thereof are legendary. The stories of people dying on a waiting list or being denied altogether read like a horror movie script.

The U.K.'s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) basically figures out who deserves treatment by using a cost-utility analysis based on the "quality adjusted life year."

One year in perfect health gets you one point. Deductions are taken for blindness, for being in a wheelchair and so on.

The more points you have, the more your life is considered worth saving, and the likelier you are to get care."
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=333933006516877

somewhere in there the author also said:

“People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn’t have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless,”

As it turns out the authors attempt at a comparison failed because while he was trying to say that if Hawking were born in the UK his life would be worth less. Why did it fail? Because Hawking does live in the UK. And apparently the NHS did provide him with treatment. I guess he had enough points. If it were you instead of him and you were not a brilliant cosmologists would you have enough points sitting in a wheelchair?

The author missed a pretty big detail and honorably retracted it as you can see if you link to the link. But he was dead on right that the system in the UK does assign a point value to your life.

And did you know that a "quality adjusted life year" as they use in England is already written into law here in the stimulus bill? So if you hear someone say that it is not in the health care bill they will be right. If they say it is not being advanced here they will be wrong.