Some of you are also assuming that the private sector provides healthcare more efficiently than the public sector. We spend more money than the countries ranked at the top of the list and have a worse healthcare system. And the amount we are spending is accelerating at a startling pace.

http://www.nchc.org/facts/cost.shtml

In 2008, the United States will spend 17 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on health care. It is projected that the percentage will reach 20 percent by 2017.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_system#United_States

In 2005, the United States spent 15.2% of GDP on health care, or US$6,347 per capita.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_system#France

In 2005, France spent 11.2% of GDP on health care, or US$3,926 per capita

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_system#Italy

In 2005, Italy spent 8.9% of GDP on health care, or US$2,714 per capita

Nowhere in the world is healthcare free. The argument is who should be expected to pay for it.

Problem with private healthcare is that the producer has such an upper hand in knowledge. The consumer can't know if he really needs the product or not. The producer can always say:
- 'hey, we need to take these extra special blood samples, and you also need to go through a magnetic resonance scan'
- 'oh, ok.'

And of course the producer has a huge economical motive to do all these unneccessary examinations because they bring in a lot of cash.

Which is exactly why the word free in those quotation marks...

Just to throw something out there: The cost of health to the UK Government per year is less than the Government's debts... so, actually, for the past ~20odd years, nobody's paid for it.

EDIT: That 20 year figure is just a complete and utter guess, I don't know how long the trends have been this way.

Your a student and your comparing to someone who's town has been destroyed do to factories going under?

If his life is how most of the poors life is in the UK.  Which other brits have attested too... it's just downright horrible.

The problem with our current system, is the consumer doesn’t care what it costs. If I have insurance, I never price shop. I never ask why it costs so much, or question it. I can go to the hospital for a cold, pay my 20 bucks, and go home.

The consumer doesn’t care that it just cost $400 for 5 minutes of a consultation. They are not paying it.

Our current healthcare system is so screwed up, it’s not even funny. Socializing it however, is not the answer. Regulating it is.

@Kasz You have people like that in the US, too. Just because you don't know about it, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Poverty levels, I believe, are roughly the same in both the US and the UK.

Watch this if you want to know just how badly some Americans have to live: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rD65UKgB6hU

It's a stream of a BBC documentary (you can't watch it on the BBC site because you're outside of the UK).

 Oh yeah, that's a big factor too. The lack of consumer interest in how much stuff cost. The consequence of an insurance based system.

How can it be changed?

This is a little off topic. That is why I hate vets. My old dog was very ill when he was young, but instead of the vet giving us Cure A (Can't remember the names), which was cheap and worked well. Instead he gave us Cure B, which was expensive and inneffective. My dog nearly died due to this and we lost a crap load of money.

It wasn't until we decided to take him to a skin specialist that told us that Cure A costs 50 quid and need to be done once or twice. He told us all vets know about it and some give Cure B because they earn more money off it, even though it has a high fatality rate.

Needless to say we promptly left the original vets.