We recently had a discussion here about health care reform and whether it would cover SRS. Someone sent me an interesting thing the other day that dovetails with that, and the National Healthcare System side-discussion that entailed, nicely.

http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/46/2/38980580.pdf

What I'd particularly like to point out is the comparison, in the second graph, between the U.S. and the U.K. That graph breaks down public-sector/private-sector spending on healthcare by country in terms of dollars per resident, adjusted for currency value. The stats are all compiled by OECD, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, a fairly objective organization not famous for grinding axes.

As background, note that the U.K. has a dual healthcare system -- the NHS and a private healthcare system not unlike the U.S., albeit tinier since the vast majority opt to use the public system. The particular stat that jumps out at me, is that the U.S., in all its public-sector spending on healthcare, including Medicare, SCHIP, VA, etc., is already spending more per person (using the entire national population as the denominator, NOT merely those who are being served) than the U.K. does for BOTH of its systems.

In other words, in theory, we could actually afford to convert our entire public-sector spending into a U.S. National Healthcare System that would cover everybody without it costing an extra penny in public expenditure (after implementation.) As previously noted, the U.K. NHS does recognize TS as a treatable condition and for those willing to wait and jump through the necessary flaming hoops, it can cover the complete cost. Also, as previously noted, it is possible to "go private" in the U.K. for almost any medical condition. My understanding is that private healthcare in Britain is actually less expensive than private healthcare in the U.S., at least in part due to the competition from the NHS, but also because there are no "hidden costs" (in the form of unpayable bills to those uninsured being treated in hospitals) being passed on to people who can pay.