Yes, I agree that both the U.S. healthcare system and socialized medicine have their problems.

I do think there are problems with the insurance companies, but this is due party because of government intervention. For example, the HMO act of 1973 allowed for the rapid expansion of HMO’s. If I looked deeper, I’m sure I can find all sorts of ways that the government makes insurance companies more prolific than they would of been if no intervention had ever occurred.

You are right, of course, that neither example I gave really support any argument for or against either system. I didn’t really intend it to be, but I suppose it might have sounded that way. Like I said earlier, I am also critical of both the US system and socialized medicine (probably for many of the same reasons you are), and personally wish for something entirely different (but I’ll admit I don’t always know what that “different” should be.

In regards to your examples of elderly being let go into taxi cabs, this occurs in the reality of non-free market health care system. The U.S. healthcare system has many aspects of government intervention, from outright socialization of some things, to subsidation, and regulation. I believe this government inervention has worsened healthcare considerably. Therefore, no examples of poor healthcare in the US can serve as evidence against my position.

Furthermore, citing good healthcare for your MIL does not prove the efficacy of socialized medicine either. There are plenty of bad stories I can give for healthcare in the UK, and stories of good care from the US.

For lots of reasons, I am critical of both forms of delivering medical care.

But the current debate you are having sticks in my mind because of two glaring situations.

My 80 yo somewhat frail MIL in London just suffered a broken tibia and has been the hospital all week. She has a full leg cast and is being assessed on her ability to get to the bathroom, etc. with crutches before being discharged. I understand the available support at home will also be assessed before she is discharged and sent home. It is likely some intermediate care in the home will be provided, as well as home physical therapy and doctor visits, etc. because her daughter, who lives with her, will still have to go to work, etc. and cannot provide 100% care 24/7 (believe, me, she would do 100% 24/7 if she could). None of this will be billed by NHS, as my MIL is a pensioner on the most basic of SS incomes, lives in a council owned flat, and has few assets (nor does my SIL have assets). She reports to me that *no* elderly people have to choose between their medications and food because there is no charge for medications. While I am not exactly a fan of socialized medicine because of the “nanny knows best” attitudes that can come with it, the excellent care my MIL is receiving is hard to ignore (and be so far away in another country and unable to directly help, I am truly grateful for it).

Contrast that with US hospitals discharging elderly poor patients (probably not so unlike my MIL) into taxi-cabs, in hospital gowns, sometimes disoriented, and left at the door of homeless shelters and charity missions. Some have been found wandering in the streets and roads, all because they are an expensive burden to the hospitals and there is no interest in assisting them with what they need. I feel shame about that, that that could happen any day in this country, let alone be a common occurrence in many large metropolitan US cities.

Not that I’m defending the heavily socialized (but not 100% so) U.S. healthcare system.

Furthermore, when you say that one of the things that made our country great was that people cared, are you referring to charity? Socialization is not charity, socialization is THEFT.