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@Guerillaphoto
OK not read the whole thread but I thought I would tell you a story
back in 2003 I traveled around South America both solo and with my ex girlfriend. While in the peruvian desert in a place called Huacachina my girlfriend got Salmonella poisoning. She collapsed through lack of liquids and I found her unconcious on the toilet floor. I carried her half a mile to the nearest taxi where we rushed to the local Hospital.
Before we were even seen by a doctor I had to pay a fee, this was basically paying for the doctors time to see me. Once he had done his initial check over he handed me a list of things which included :
IV drip x 2
Needles
tubes
medicine
etc...
I then had to pay to rent a room for a day and take the list of things to a counter where I had to pay cash to get the supplies needed to treat her. She was treated and recovered, however while at the hospital there was a car crash outside and a child was bought into the hospital with severe facial lacirations and bleeding from one of his ears. The hospital turned the mother away who was hysterically holding her bleeding child, she could not afford the medicine to treat her child and had to travel ten miles to the nearest free clinic if she wanted treatment.
I also met a woman in Bolivia who's son haf apendicitus something my sister has just been through. The operation to remove the apendix costs around $125 US dollars and she could not afford this, so instead had got pregnant with another child to replace the one that was inevitably going to die.
I will never complain about our healthcare in this country and dont understand people that do, what we have is free and saves millions of lives every year, you cannot expect an organisation which is incredibly stretched financially and equipment wise to operate a perfect service, we should be grateful for what we have.