British defend their healthcare system
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In America’s healthcare reform debate, there is no greater whipping boy than the National Health Service (NHS,) Britain’s healthcare system. The NHS is being used as an example of the “failed Socialist” model of healthcare. FOX host Glenn Beck took some shots at the NHS, apparently forgetting his own nightmare journey when he received subpar care in an American hospital. Republican Senator Chuck Grassley told a radio station last week that “countries that have government-run health care” would not have given Senator Edward Kennedy, who suffers from a brain tumor, the same kind of care as in the U.S. because he is too old. And most impressively, FOX News’s treasure, Neil Cavuto, even claimed universal healthcare is a terrorism recruitment tool. Seriously.
Conservative hosts and politicians alike must have been overcome with joy when they finally secured a Conservative British politician who was willing to bad mouth the NHS, which remains extraordinarily popular in Britain. Daniel Hannan previously sat as an Independent after having been expelled from the European People’s Party. Hannan is most famous for opposing the European Union and praising Iceland’s “economic miracle” prior to the country’s titanic crash in 2008. It was probably that stellar resume that first caught the eye of FOX News, which couldn’t secure the microphone to his lapel fast enough.
These kinds of attacks on the NHS aren’t unusual or new, but what is unique is the British response this time to the mad attacks on their healthcare system. British citizens — particularly tech savvy residents — are fighting back on Twitter. The top trending topics after Hannan’s FOX declarations included #welovetheNHS and #NHS. British Twitterers boasted ‘I Heart NHS’ avatars designed by Twibbon, a group that spreads awareness about causes by overlaying an image onto supporters’ Twitter profile avatars. The Twibbon team says during our interview that the response to the ‘I Heart NHS’ design has been “magnificent.” They add, “In the UK, people often talk about political apathy and show concern over disappointing voting turnouts. What everyone has shown over the last few days is a testament to the power of social networking, and Twitter in particular, not only to unite people in solidarity, but also to initiate global conversations at grassroots level.”
Graham Linehan, the man behind the #welovetheNHS tag, tells me he was motivated by FOX’s irresponsible coverage of the healthcare reform debate.
I think that the way that FOX News has been raising the temperature of the health care debate over there is one of the most reckless and cynical things I have ever seen. It’s just mindblowing to me. It’s also infruriating the way they change their coverage of the UK according to their needs. So when they wanted a partner to legitimise an illegal and ill-thought-out war, the UK was the best country in the world. Now that their needs are different, they attack the UK as ‘Socialist’. It’s breathtaking, how little shame they have.
What really inspired Linehan to do something was when Investor’s Business Daily published an editorial claiming Steven 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.” Of course, the claim is absurd as Hawking stated later, pointing out that he would not be alive today if it hadn’t been for the NHS.
Where other British citizens saw gross lies, exaggerations, and frustrating half-truths, Linehan saw a “golden opportunity to kickstart a campaign to redress the balance a little bit.” He linked to the Hawking article and the #welovetheNHS hashtag was born. “I thought it might pick up steam once people saw the ridiculousness of that story, but I had no idea how big it would become. Three days now, and we’re still trending,” says Linehan.
The online response to the We Love the NHS campaign is overwhelming. “NHS Saved my life as a 19 year old naive lad!” writes one Brit. ”Saved my life, saved my wife’s life, beat my brother-in-law’s cancer and embodies a compassionate civilized ideal #welovetheNHS,” writes one more. The movement now includes some of Britain’s most powerful leaders, including Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who Tweeted “NHS often makes the difference between pain and comfort, despair and hope, life and death. Thanks for always being there #welovetheNHS.”
British newspapers, politicians, and medics are rushing into the debate partly to defend the NHS and partly to gain some kind of political leverage. Labor hoped to embarrass David Cameron by challenging him to disown the Hannan comments, which he did. “Nobody should be in any doubt, for the Conservative Party, the NHS is the number one priority,” said Cameron to Sky News.
The British newspaper, Daily Mirror, has started calling America ”the land of the fee” because of the way patients are forced to pay for medical services. Senior figures in British healthcare are also frustrated at the portrayal of the NHS. Mike Hobday, of Macmillan Cancer Support, stated: “We are really furious at the way in which the NHS, which is the best healthcare system around, is being denigrated by a group of people who clearly don’t have the first idea about how it works.”
“The NHS does a damn fine job,” says president of the UK Faculty of Public Health, Dr. Alan Maryon-Davis. “These claims are complete and utter rubbish…The horrific thing about the American system is that there are tens of millions of people without health insurance. We spend less on health in terms of GDP than America but if you look at health indices, especially for life expectancy, we have better figures than they do in America,” he adds.
The nexus of the Internet makes the dissemination of disinformation difficult. Such interconnectedness means the lie of “dangerous Socialized medicine” cannot sustain itself when Brits of all ages and backgrounds shout to the rafters that they love the NHS, and are here to defend it.
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[...] from Allison Kilkenny’s blog. Also available on Facebook and [...]
On one hand such a hopeful story: Britons using social web networking to stamp out manipulation of popular opinion. The mass online testimonials give it a certain populist purity.
On the other hand, i feel like i’m gazing longingly over the pond wondering, “why the hell can’t we work together like that?” Big news in America is the astroturfers wailing in town halls about everything going to hell.
Is it not too late for the US to use web 2.0 to build enough real grass roots consciousness/dialog (that eschews the mainstream media fog) so that we can begin to affect actual change and take our country back from the Corptocracy?
Great piece. The problem in the US is we do not have a debate on healthcare, we have the GOP using the issue to try and embarass Obama. The reason for all these lies is not because they really believe this garbage it is just to try and scare older people and confuse the real problems in our system that do need attention. Citizens in every other country I have visited in Europe, England and Canada are much happier with their system than most people in the US are with our system.
Exactly. It’s a continuation of our politicians’ (and media’s) rich tradition of politicizing issues rather than explaining them to the American people. The result is a bunch of confused, scared white people screaming about death panels and Hitler. Paul Krugman wrote about this on his blog yesterday. He re-posted two headlines originally posted at Talking Points Memo:
Then Krugman wrote:
Instead of debating important ideas, politicians (with an assist from some in the media) are politicizing the issue, which is really just business as usual.
In response to another comment. See in context »“The nexus of the Internet makes the dissemination of disinformation difficult. Such interconnectedness means the lie of “dangerous Socialized medicine” cannot sustain itself when Brits of all ages and backgrounds shout to the rafters that they love the NHS, and are here to defend it.”
I’m not sure about the idea that if people are just given the right information they’ll believe it. People in America believe in faith not rational argument. Until that philosophy fundamentally changes, you’ll have these conspiracy theorists who believe Canada and the UK hate their healthcare…
And I say conspiracy theorists because it’s impossible to believe that these countries hate their healthcare… without being a conspiracy theorist. I mean in the U.S. election there were commercials about how Canadians hate their Healthcare. At the same time there was Canadian election going on in which the main issue was Healthcare… and you know what the issues were with it? Where to fund it, how much should one increase funding of it, etc. Not that it would be privatized or not. No Canadian politician in their right mind would say that.
And yet many millions of Americans, I’m sure, quite readily believed Canadians hated their Healthcare… but how? Canadians opinions were quite open for anybody willing to look. The prime minster debate was on youtube, it dealt with healthcare. The five party leaders all defended it, while accusing each other of trying to harm it. Here’s a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL93NkHmvy4
So while the internet is great for it’s ability to deliver actual information… it won’t much matter until the United States changes from being a country of faith to a country of reason. They will never know how to differentiate good information from bad information, and there will always be conspiracy theorists. Because they don’t need proof showing that Margaret Thatcher never said “the NHS is safe in our hands”… their faith says she didn’t. And under their philosophy of faith, they aren’t wrong.
Conspiracy theorists aren’t new, nor are the fringe crazies, who will continue to ignore facts even when they’re waved in their faces, so you’re right — we’ll never win over those people. Politics is a constant battle to win Independents: fairly rational people, who are undecided regarding key issues (example: healthcare reform,) and who are open to persuasion.
It’s the role of the media in a democracy to give the populace tools i.e. facts to make informed decisions. The Internet can sometimes help with that, but usually only if the mainstream media picks up on stories fleshed out in the Obsessive-compulsive disorder-oriented Internet community. Otherwise, I believe you’re right that the ghettoized nature of the Internet results in Conservatives reading Conservative blogs, and Liberals reading Liberal blogs, making it difficult to disprove conspiracy theories, since conspiracy theorists usually only read blogs reaffirming their own beliefs.
In response to another comment. See in context »Is there an actual debate going on about healthcare?
There is a debate among big business, which translates to a debate in the congress. But generally don’t the majority of the public support single payer? Around 60%, pretty consistently? Or have the democrats and republicans convinced them this is a bad plan? I haven’t read recent polls on the topic, so I don’t know.
Unless they have, I don’t think it’s possible to get more than 60% support from the public on this topic. 20-25% of the public are complete nut-jobs and another 15-20 percent are pretty firmly libertarian.
I think at this point, it’s not about convincing people that socialized medicine is good. It’s more about getting single payer advocates to be as pro-active (though not as insane) as the people holding the obnoxious Obama/Hitler signs. To which posts like yours are obviously useful. I had no idea about the Dan Hannan story for instance.
In response to another comment. See in context »I watched the airing of Glenn Beck’s accusations against American health care when he received less than stellar treatment. How can he now act as though we have a wonderful system? Instead of knocking the NHS, we need to pick up some tips, and Beck and others like him should consider reporting the truth.
Interestingly, Beck spoke against America’s healthcare system when he was on CNN. He didn’t turn anti-reform until he moved to FOX.
In response to another comment. See in context »This “debate” is really getting on my nerves. There is nothing, and I mean NOTHING, that I have seen in the mainstream media that has even attempted to report anything about what heath care reform really entails. All of these catch phrases, half-truths, and mudslinging is completely ridiculous. Both sides are doing it and it is truly sad. Thanks for calling them on it, Alison. You do a wonderful job of that.
The worst part about this “health care debate” is that I have not heard anyone say anything about healthy lifestyles. Shouldn’t that be a vital part of a “health care debate”? It’s almost like they like the fact that people get sick so that someone can profit from it. I find it very interesting that people are neglecting that part of the argument because it could possible be the most important aspect of health!!! I think that many Americans, in general, live fairly unhealthy lives in a lot of different ways. Have you heard from anyone “important” who has pushed that side of the argument?
[...] in reaction to conservative American FUD about death panels and severe criticism of the NHS, the #welovetheNHS tag gave Brits a chance to stand up for the service. Both could be viewed as showcases of the power [...]