> And what the report misses out is that in many other countries patients are not put off from seeking care due to cost either...and they achieve better outcome

> And what the report misses out is that in many other countries patients are not put off from seeking care due to cost either...and they achieve better outcomes. They do this through a mix of private and public healthcare which is naturally intolerable to the NHS. It's "naturally intolerable to the NHS" because of its key tenets, which are: * Free at the point of delivery * Equality of care for all i.e. There shouldn't be a tiered system where rich people get more. That leads to distortions and incentives to provide more for rich people and less for the poor. There would also be incentives for governments to start shrinking the pot of cash available to the NHS to make individuals pay more. The ideals I think are correct, and if I don't like them then I can get private healthcare for a significantly lower price than if the NHS didn't exist (because the NHS does all the difficult expensive stuff, like A&E): that means the private providers are protected from some of the worst costs of providing healthcare.