An article in todays internet version of the Guardian Newspaper of London reveals just what can happen if Americans allow our politicians to turn over our health Care to a bunch of bureaucrats.( and do not expect to see this information in any newspaper or on TV in the USA!)
 This article is a frightening portent of what is to come if we allow the Democrats to ram their socialized medicine Bill through Congress to satisfy one of Obama's campaign promises!
The true scandal of NHS hospitals failing to comply with basic safety standards is revealed in today's Observer. Research that ranks every general hospital in England against a range of safety measures has named 12 NHS hospital trusts judged to be "significantly underperforming".


This is despite the fact that last month the Care Quality Commission, the health service regulator, judged overall care at eight of the trusts to be good or excellent. Today's study by Dr Foster, an NHS partner organisation that collates and analyses healthcare data, also highlights 27 trusts with unusually high death rates. Almost 5,000 more patients in their care died in the past year than was expected.

Revelations of such widespread safety failings will send shockwaves through the NHS, already reeling from scandals at two trusts last week. Poor nursing care, filthy wards and hundreds of unnecessary deaths were exposed at Basildon and Thurrock University NHS Hospitals Foundation Trust, and the chair of the NHS trust in Colchester was fired.

Now the new data proves that key safety failings are occurring in 11 more hospital trusts across England. They include Scarborough and North East Yorkshire Healthcare Trust, South London Healthcare Trust, Weston Area Health Trust, Hereford Hospitals Trust, Lewisham Hospital Trust and University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire Trust. Eighteen were found to have death rates the same or higher than at Colchester. Ministers want to know why seven in particular have had persistently high death rates over five years.

The Department of Health yesterday ordered the CQC to investigate if any other trusts needed urgent attention. The CQC said it was "monitoring closely a number of other trusts", but had no evidence there was another case in England where it would take action of the kind taken at Basildon.

John Black, president of the Royal College of Surgeons, last night told the Observer that patient safety had been neglected by hospitals too busy meeting NHS-imposed financial targets: "Too many hospitals are too concerned with meeting financial targets at the expense of clinical standards, and we are seeing patients suffering as a consequence."

Today's research exposes systemic failures in large parts of the NHS during the last financial year and finds:
¦ 39% of trusts failing to investigate unexpected deaths or cases of serious harm on their wards.
¦ At least 209 incidents in which "foreign objects", such as swabs and drill-bits, were left inside patients after surgery.
* At least 82 cases in which medical staff operated on the wrong part of the patient's body.

It finds that 5,024 people died after being admitted for "low-risk" conditions such as asthma or appendicitis, of whom 848 were under 65. A proportion of those deaths will be linked to safety errors.

The Conservatives reacted by promising a complete overhaul of the regulation system, which rated Basildon "good" only weeks ago. Andrew Lansley, the shadow health secretary, said: "Labour's failed health inspection regime is more interested in targets than patients." He also questioned the timing of the Basildon announcement. Officials knew of the hospital's failings weeks ago but decided to publicise them last Thursday, just days before the Dr Foster research was due to be published in the Observer".


The NHS in London defines Health Trusts thusly: "Hospitals are managed by acute trusts, which make sure that hospitals provide high-quality healthcare, and that they spend their money efficiently. They also decide on a strategy for how the hospital will develop, so that services improve.


Acute trusts employ a large part of the NHS workforce, including nurses, doctors, pharmacists, midwives and health visitors, as well as people doing jobs related to medicine – physiotherapists, radiographers, podiatrists, speech and language therapists, counsellors, occupational therapists, psychologists and healthcare scientists. There are many other non-medical staff employed by acute trusts, including receptionists, porters, cleaners, specialists in information technology, managers, engineers, caterers and domestic and security staff.

Some acute trusts are regional or national centres for more specialised care. Others are attached to universities and help to train health professionals. Acute trusts can also provide services in the community, for example through health centres, clinics or in people's homes. All the above are run by bureaucrats!

Americans wake up before we trash the best health care in the World and turn the doctor patient relationship into a patient/ bureaucrat relationship!

Before I write about the subject that I chose for todays blog. I aam comeled to offer this feature article that appears in the London Telegraph about our President winning the Nobel Peace Prize. It illustrates the absurdity of the prize for a man who has been president for only 37 weeks and has not overwelmed all in Great Britain.
"Barack Obama has won the Nobel Peace prize and I’m still reeling at the shock. Most of us are, I should think.

Here are my theories as to how it might have come about:
1. Unlike in most of the rest of the world Øbama Køøl Aid (TM) remains Oslo’s most popular beverage.
2. The Norwegian prize committee’s sense of irony is growing ever more sophisticated, as it hinted when it gave the prize in 2002 to comedy ex-president Jimmy Carter, and hinted more strongly when it gave the prize in 2007 to climate-fear-promoting comedy failed-president Al Gore.
3. The other candidates on the shortlist were Robert Mugabe; Osama Bin Laden; Ahmed Jibril; and the late Pol Pot". (not everyone is swooning over the selection) It is important to note the fact that Obama was nominated for the Nobel prize in January at which time he was in office less than a month!!


While Obama and his sycophants Senator Reid and Speaker Pelosi are trying to take over 1/6th of the economy with their socialized medicine scam. I think it is important that we all understand the problems incumbent upon any government controled program, particularly our personal Health Care!
The number of NHS( in England, Scotand and Wales) errors putting patients at risk has soared by 12 per cent in just six months, according to figures released yesterday.

They show that 459,500 patient safety incidents occurred between October 2008 and March this year, compared to around 410,000 in the previous six months.
Of the latest cases, more than 5,700 victims died or suffered serious harm as a result.
At risk: The number of NHS errors rose 12 per cent in six months
Health service bosses say the rise is likely to have occurred since trusts are being encouraged to report incidents, rather than because the number of mistakes is actually increasing. ( YOU MEAN THEY WERE NOT REPORTING ERRORS BEFORE BEING ORDERED?)
But critics argue stringent Whitehall targets make doctors and nurses more likely to make serious mistakes. GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS WILL DO THIS HERE IN THE USA!

They say the latest figures are likely to be only the tip of the iceberg, as so many previous mistakes have been swept under the carpet rather than being reported to the authorities.
The National Patient Safety Agency revealed most reported incidents - 303,016, or 66 per cent - resulted in no harm to the patient, while 122,246, or 27 per cent, resulted in low harm.
A further 28,521 (6 per cent) of incidents resulted in moderate harm while 5,717 (1 per cent) resulted in death or severe harm.

The most commonly reported incident was an accident involving the patient that could possibly have been prevented..
This was followed by errors or near misses with treatments or procedures (10.1 per cent) and medication (9.4 per cent).
Reports were provided by 382 out of the 392 health trusts in England.

Around 28,000 reports, six per cent of the total, resulted in moderate harm which included mistakes made in surgery that would require a repeat operation, a patient falling out of bed and knocking themselves unconscious for a short period or wrong blood given a patient resulting in temporary kidney failure.

The 3,717 reports of severe harm will have included things like a patient given the wrong medication which they are allergic to making their heart stop resulting in brain damage, ambulance crews moving a patient with a back injury resulting in paralysis or wrong blood given to a young woman meaning she will develop antibodies that could affect any future pregnancy. SOURCE:LONDON TELEGRAPH
Forget the cost of private insurance. You can always absorb this cost, but if the socialization of our medical care costs you your life or a loved one. No amount of savings or expenditure will restore it!

There are too many reasons why I think Obamacare is a bad deal for Americans, but there is one thing hidden in the House bill that we refer to as Obamacare that really should scare anyone who is over 55 years of age.
The language in the House bill establishes a panel that has the authority to decide what treatments will be included in The Government "option" health plan.And there is the implication that they can forbid certain expensive treatments to senior citizens.
Every country that has National health care has rationing of care for seniors and the "infirmed" people who are not considered "productive" citizems!

It is a fact of basic economics that you cannot increase the number of people covered by health care without increasing the cost of operating the program.
The present medicare and medicaid programs are in effect bankrupt. So how can we add more people to the government health care programs without limiting access to care or raising taxes prohibitively.

An example of what rationing might do is seen in the case of one of President Obama's Medal of Freedom recipients.
If Stephen Hawking, an Honorary fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, had been treated in a country that rationed care to the infirmed, he would not have survived to be awarded his Presidential Medal of Freedom yesterday.
They would have said in his youth that the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, was essentially worthless!. That was the thundering verdict of the Investor's Business Daily on our National Health Service and Mr Obama's plans to introduce what Republicans term "socialised" medicine.

Professor Hawking, who is completely paralysed by motor neurone disease, has been treated by the NHS throughout his 67 years, and points out indignantly that he would not have lived without its care.Stephen Hawking,is a astro-physicist and professor at the University of Cambridge.

In England, government health officials have decided that "$22,750 is how much six months of life is worth. Under their socialised system, if a medical treatment costs more, you're out of luck. That's wrong for America."Apparently they have excepts for outstanding academics and politicians much like our U.S> Congress that has thei own health plan and refuses to give it up and participate in the plan they propose for US!

The figure comes from Britain's National Institute for Clinical Evidence, which evaluates treatments in terms of the average increase in life expectancy. If the cost of prolonging someone's life for a year exceeds more than £30,000, then the NHS will not pay for that treatment. In other words, although there are no "death panels", the fundamental point is correct. The NHS does decide that some treatments are too expensive. And if that means you die? Our condolences, says the Government. Dr.Hawkins apparently was a special case!

Despite the myths from the Left, and Obama, about the American system,that you have to take your credit card to the emergency room, and if you can't pay you won't be treated. This is a blatant lie and he knows it because federal law forbids emergency rooms from denying treatment!

It is beyond dispute that treatment in the US is better than in any country that has socialised medicine. Diagnosed with prostate cancer and want to survive for the next five years? In Britain you have a 74 per cent chance. In the US, it is 98 per cent. For leukaemia, the American survival rate is close to half, while in Europe it is a third.

Ability to pay, of course, is central to the American system. If you have good insurance, you will get the very best treatment in the world – and the money spent by Americans ensures that the boundaries of medicine are constantly being expanded.This country developed statins, most high blood pressure medicines and the twentieth century saw a remarkable upsurge of research on drugs, with major advances in the treatment of bacterial and viral infections, heart disease, stomach ulcers, cancer, and mental illnesses. These, along with the introduction of the oral contraceptive, have altered all of our lives.

On Monday, Mr Obama promised: "You will not be waiting in any lines." That statement will prompt a wry smile for anyone who has used the NHS. He also said that his proposals had the support of the American Association for Retired People, and that he had never been a supporter of the British-style "single payers" system – both things demonstrably not true. His campaign vow not to raise middle-class taxes to pay for health care reform is already being quietly put to one side.SOURCE:TELEGTAPH.CO.UK

And that is why I oppose the passage of Obamacare!

While squandering the future of our children and grandchildren, President Obama has proposed myriad welfare programs to involve the Federal Government in what is traditionally the private sector.If you add the stimulus and the omnibus you get about $1.2 trillion.
He has already signed into law a National budget that contains "earmarks" that spend eight billion dollars for pet projects for Congressional districts to allow Congressman and Senators to go back to the States and tell voters that they should be elected again to their "princely" position in Washington because they brought home the "bacon"!

Senators quietly tucked 8000 earmarks into the $$410 billion spending bill/tax package that was signed in a closed signing by Obama yesterday.
Some of the "important "earmarks' include a $2 million tax benefit for makers of wooden arrows for children; a $100 million tax break to benefit auto racetrack owners; $192 million in rebates on excise taxes for the Puerto Rican and Virgin Islands rum industry; $148 million in tax relief for U.S. wool fabric producers; and a $49 million tax benefit for fishermen and other plaintiffs who sued over the 1989 tanker Exxon Valdez spill.The 1,132-page bill has an extraordinary reach, wrapping together nine spending bills to fund the annual operating budgets of every Cabinet department except Defense, Homeland Security and Veterans Affairs.
How does this help the economy in the USA?

With the economy as indicated by the stock market reacting negatively to the tax and spend programs of the new President. Obama is charging ahead with his effort to socialize our medical system.
He is using "facts" and figures to support the concept of National Health Insurance for every person in the USA that don't really equate.


In addition to propping up the failed Big 3 in Detroit to the tune of billions of dollars needed because of the exorbitant Union contracts. On of the driving force for the National Health insurance is that costs have long been a problem for U.S. auto companies. General Motors spends more per car on health care than it does on steel. But as more American companies face global competition, the "value gap" is being felt by more CEOs — and their hard pressed workers.

One thing the report does not do is endorse the same solution that countries like Canada have adopted: a government-run health care system.

Since America continues to move from a manufacturing based economy to a service economy, and employee working patterns continue to evolve, health insurance coverage has become less stable.The service sector offers less access to health insurance than its manufacturing counterparts, and it is true that due to rising health insurance premiums, many small small employers cannot afford to offer health benefits, and those that do offer it require the employee to share in the cost. Thus, many employees opt to decline the health insurance to get more money in their pay check!

Nearly 46 million Americans, or 18 percent,of our population under age 65 are without health insurance as of US census statistics published in 2007.
The percentage of uninsured Hispanics (many illegals) is 32.1 % or 15 million people. To put the number of people with out health insurance in perspective, you have to understand that as of this morning at 11:25am we have 363,992,936 people living in the USA!

To satisfy the Unions and radicals that hate the free enterprise system that is the envy of all other nations. President Obama wants to destroy the best health care system in the World and replace it with National Health like you find in Canada, Sweden and Great Britain.

To plan the destruction of the health care system ,that people who can afford it, come from Canada, England, Germany and South America to be treated is nothing more than travesty!!

An article published in the London Times today illustrates the problems you face when you replace the decision makers( patients and doctors) with bureaucrats.
Over the years that England and the British Isles has had Socialized medicine thousands of doctors and nurses have left the medical field to seek other employment. Many of them have emigrated to the USA.
AS a result Marie Burnham(A NHS bureaucrat) has flown to Eastern Europe in an urgent attempt to find six A&E doctors and six qualified anaesthetists.

But her hopes of hiring 200 nurses there to fill vacancies have been prevented by a "ridiculous" Government ban on bringing in foreign nursing staff.

Miss Burnham, chief executive of Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust, said: "We will always look to the UK first for staff, but there is a shortage of doctors and we can go to the EU to recruit excellent staff.What she does not tell you is that the NHS has just reduced the number of hours that doctors must be on duty from 60 hours a week to 48 hours like a factory worker!

"Nurse recruitment is a difficult issue. We can't go abroad for staff nurses any more because the Government no longer sees it as a shortage profession. It's a ridiculous situation but it's what we have to work with."

Miss Burnham, who took up her post eight months ago, described recruitment as "essential" to improving morale of overworked staff in overflowing wards.

As well as promoting East Lancashire throughout the UK, the trust is advertising posts through the Job Centre, NHS Jobs and newspapers.

Despite fears of job cuts due to the recession, she revealed that all 37 student nurses who trained with the trust this year have been offered permanent posts.

She has flown out the 750 miles to Prague in an attempt to identify suitable candidates for the unfilled doctors' posts.

Caroline Collins, of the Royal College of Nursing, said politicians, the NHS and universities had failed to plan nursing training properly for a number of years.

She said: "It was only three years ago that there were jobs lost all over the country, including 70 in East Lancashire, and nurses were coming out of training to find there were no jobs.

"After that, trained people got jobs in the private sector and students turned away from nursing as a career option. Now we are going through the other end of that cycle, and we haven't got enough nurses to fill the posts."

Darren Reynolds, of the "It's Our NHS campaign" group, said mistakes made by the trust in 2007 had resulted in low staff morale and a bad reputation which it had "an awful lot of work" to do to repair. And Obama wants to substitute this mess for our quality if expensive health care!
And he could have mentioned that it takes 18 weeks o get a referral to a specialist in surgery for even the most serious illnesses!