Gutfeld:"U.K. Doesn't Let People Die In The Street,It Lets Them Die in The Hospital"

[Cicero]

Gutfeld:"U.K. Doesn't Let People Die In The Street,It Lets Them Die in The Hospital"

Russell Brand at the MTV Awards spoke of the difference between Britain and the US: "Instead of truck, we say lorry, instead of elevator we say lift, and instead of letting people die in the street we have free healthcare."

This assessment of American health care by another MTV dopey host was fodder for FOX News "Red Eye" host Greg Gutfeld"

"This is why the people truly scared of socialized medicine are those who already have it. I lived in Britain for three years and can verify that folks like Russell did not take advantage of Britain's free health care. No, they paid out of pocket to private doctors, so they wouldn't end up dead on a gurney in an empty hallway."

"According to a report from Nursing Times, NHS hospital deaths due to errors have soared 60 percent in a single year. Worse, according to The Telegraph, nine of 10 preventable deaths under government care aren't even reported. Of the roughly 72,000 deaths in the NHS each year, only 3,200 are noted by the National Patient Safety Agency."

"And let's not forget Harold Shipman. You remember him: He's a British doctor and the world's most prolific serial killer. He practiced medicine for two decades, while murdering hundreds of patients as a hobby. He went undetected because the idea of older, healthier patients dying in British hospitals didn't seem that odd."

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,550400,00.html

 

[Architect]

Is that the best you can do? A second hand link to Fox?

Try harder next time.

 

[Cicero]

Is that the best you can do? A second hand link to Fox?

Try harder next time.

Your complaint is that this appears on the "The Greg-Alogue," not that it isn't true? OK. Duly noted.

 

[Dr Adequate]

This assessment of American health care by another MTV dopey host was fodder for FOX News "Red Eye" host Greg Gutfeld"

"This is why the people truly scared of socialized medicine are those who already have it.

That's an incredibly stupid lie even considering that it's coming from a FOX News host.

Tell me, were you suckered into believing it even for a moment?

 

[Safe-Keeper]

"This is why the people truly scared of socialized medicine are those who already have it. I lived in Britain for three years and can verify that folks like Russell did not take advantage of Britain's free health care. No, they paid out of pocket to private doctors, so they wouldn't end up dead on a gurney in an empty hallway."

Seems made-up to me. Far as I know, it's the people who make use of the NHS that are happy with it, and...

...oh, wait, it's FOX News. My bad.

Still want to address this little gem, though:

"According to a report from Nursing Times, NHS hospital deaths due to errors have soared 60 percent in a single year. Worse, according to The Telegraph, nine of 10 preventable deaths under government care aren't even reported. Of the roughly 72,000 deaths in the NHS each year, only 3,200 are noted by the National Patient Safety Agency."

Two major red flags here. Firstly, any time someone says there's an increase of 60%, they should also provide the product of the percentage increase (or decrease). If you have two cents in your bank account and add a whooping 300% to the number, you still have no more than six cents.

Also, how did it "soar 60%"? Was the end sum 60% higher or was 60% added to the initial number? ETA: I'm not good at explaining this kind of thing, so I'll let the Wiki do it for me:

Consider the following hypothetical example: in 1980, 40 percent of the population smoked, and in 1990 only 30 percent smoked. We can thus say that from 1980 to 1990, the incidence of smoking decreased by 10 percentage points even though smoking did not decrease by 10 percent (actually it decreased by 25 percent) — percentages indicate ratios, not differences.​

Secondly, the "in a single year" addition sounds like that old ploy from climate deniers - "this year temperatures have gone down, therefore AGW is over!". Maybe this was a bad year for medical staff, for one reason or another. Says nothing about the overall trend. If the number of deaths in hospitals was slightly lower than usual, would FOX News trumpet the decrease as "so and so many percents in a single year"? I doubt this very much.

"And let's not forget Harold Shipman. You remember him: He's a British doctor and the world's most prolific serial killer. He practiced medicine for two decades, while murdering hundreds of patients as a hobby. He went undetected because the idea of older, healthier patients dying in British hospitals didn't seem that odd."

That's quite a conclusion to draw. How was it reached?

 

[Uzzy]

********. Shipman got away with it as, surprisingly, old people die. Coupled with a lack of detailed information kept on deaths per individual practice, and Shipman's practice of forging death certificates (and a good bit of police incompetence). Further, he worked alone, so all information about any deaths in his practice came from him.

I've seen some disgraceful behaviour from the Fox idiots in regards to attacking the NHS, but bringing Shipman into the debate just takes the biscuit.

 

[Safe-Keeper]

Your complaint is that this appears on the "The Greg-Alogue," not that it isn't true? OK. Duly noted.

The two seem to go together hand in hand.

 

[Cicero]

That's quite a conclusion to draw. How was it reached?

The same way that some in the U.K., Canada, and Europe reached their conclusion that the current American health care system is a sign of an uncivilized society?

 

[Cicero]

That's an incredibly stupid lie even considering that it's coming from a FOX News hostRussell Brand.

Tell me, were you suckered into believing it even for a moment?

Fixed.

 

[Dr Adequate]

Fixed.

Running away from my question fixes nothing, Cicero.

It's a simple question, Cicero. Do you believe Gutfeld's dumbass lies?

Or are you posting it simply as an example of how deeply conservative liars can degrade themselves by wallowing in the filthy crap of their making? If the latter, I congratulate you on having found an excellent example.

 

[Baylor]

Running away from my question fixes nothing, Cicero.

It's a simple question, Cicero. Do you believe Gutfeld's dumbass lies?

Or are you posting it simply as an example of how deeply conservative liars can degrade themselves by wallowing in the filthy crap of their making? If the latter, I congratulate you on having found an excellent example.

You and Oscar Goodman wouldn't get along.

 

[Safe-Keeper]

The same way that some in the U.K., Canada, and Europe reached their conclusion that the current American health care system is a sign of an uncivilized society?

Not a satisfactory answer. I just looked up your friend Shipman on Wikipedia. The article was kind enough to inform me that once it was discovered that Shipman's department had an above-average death rate, an investigation began immediately, eventually leading to his arrest.

In March 1998, Dr. Linda Reynolds of the Brooke Surgery in Hyde—prompted by Deborah Massey from Frank Massey and Son's funeral parlour—expressed concerns to John Pollard, the coroner for the South Manchester District, about the high death rate among Shipman's patients. In particular, she was concerned about the large number of cremation forms for elderly women that he had needed countersigned. She claimed Shipman was, either through negligence or intent, killing his patients.​

That's a far cry from your nightmare vision of a Britain where it is considered normal for healthy elderly people to suddenly drop like flies in their hospital beds. Granted, the Wiki is not the world's most reliable source, so I'd be happy to review any documentation you may have that "[Shipman] went undetected because the idea of older, healthier patients dying in British hospitals didn't seem that odd.".

 

[Uzzy]

Having calmed down a little, one thing is clear now.

Republicans and Fox News have run out of rational arguments against Universal Health Care, if they ever had any to begin with. It's pretty obvious that they'd lose a discussion based on proper analysis of the costs and the effectiveness of UHC, so now they have to resort to fear and scaremongering. I honestly thought Palin's death panels was the lowest they could go, but bringing up the spectre of Shipman and saying 'He could happen in the USA under UHC' proved that there are no depths to which the Republicans won't plumb in their quest to scare the heck out of the American people. I feel disgusted that they'd bring him up in their attack on the NHS, but more then that, I feel sorry for anyone living with that level of political 'debate'.

 

[Safe-Keeper]

Also, I'm again baffled by how the anti-socialized health care people use two different sets of logic here.

When the discussion is about US health care, it's considered perfectly acceptable that those who can't afford health care have to put up with the mediocre government-provided alternative. Then the discussion turns to the UK, and all of a sudden private providers don't seem to be an alternative. No one on the right responds to the OP by saying that the alleged failure of the NHS is unimportant because the British can just go to private providers.

It's very, very strange.

 

[Dr Adequate]

Also, I'm again baffled by how the anti-socialized health care people use two different sets of logic here.

When the discussion is about US health care, it's considered perfectly acceptable that those who can't afford health care have to put up with the mediocre government-provided alternative. Then the discussion turns to the UK, and all of a sudden private providers don't seem to be an alternative. No one on the right responds to the OP by saying that the alleged failure of the NHS is unimportant because the British can just go to private providers.

It's very, very strange.

Well, it's stranger than that. The US shouldn't have a public option, because, heck, you can't trust the government to do anything well. And this public option will be so ultra-wonderful, that, unlike in every other country in the world, it will lead to the extinction of all private health insurance companies, leaving us only with a public option so worthless that it annihilated the competition.

 

[Rolfe]

"And let's not forget Harold Shipman. You remember him: He's a British doctor and the world's most prolific serial killer. He practiced medicine for two decades, while murdering hundreds of patients as a hobby. He went undetected because the idea of older, healthier patients dying in British hospitals didn't seem that odd."

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,550400,00.html

Point of information. None of Shipman's proven victims and very few of his suspected ones died in hospital.

Shipman was a general practitioner, working in the community. As single-handed practitioner with no colleagues keeping an eye on him. His modus operandi was to visit an elderly (sometimes not so elderly) patient in her (usually her, there were a few male victims) own home, just to give her a checkup.

Because this unsolicited behaviour, though unusual, is not unknown among NHS doctors, none of the victims seems to have suspected anything. He would suggest a vitamin shot or something like that, and inject them with heroin. They would be found peacefully dead fully dressed in their own chairs.

British law only mandates a post mortem if the cause of death is unclear or if the person hasn't seen a doctor in the past [insert number] weeks. Well, Shipman saw them just before they died, and he was quite happy to certify the death as a heart attack or whatever. He got away with it for so long that even those who suspected something couldn't quite believe it.

It had nothing to do with the NHS. Other than there being a lot of fairly healthy old people living in their own homes who weren't surprised to see a doctor who had come unannounced to check on their health.

So if that is the level of factual accuracy of that article, you know what to think of it.

Rolfe.

 

[WildCat]

The same way that some in the U.K., Canada, and Europe reached their conclusion that the current American health care system is a sign of an uncivilized society?

Why would anyone think that?

eta: embedding not allowed, so click the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cblb5QKPUXQ

 

[Rolfe]

Sorry, silly remark.

Rolfe.

 

[Cleon]

Shipman? Are you ****ing serious?

I see the anti-UHC brigade isn't even trying to have their lies make sense anymore.

Pathetic. Seriously pathetic.

How much you want to bet Cicero crosses out "anti" and puts a "fixed" by it. Predictably pathetic.

 

[themusicteacher]

AAAAUUUUUGGGGGGHHH! Socialism! Death Panels! You lie!