The United Kingdom's state religion - the Anglican Church NHS
A foreigner visiting or moving to the UK discovers soon after arrival that, unlike any other country, there is a remarkable pride and enthusiasm over its state owned, operated and (pretty much) fully taxpayer funded health service. The initials NHS are more than just a state institution or a public service, but hold a near sacred status in the UK public zeitgeist about healthcare. You saw it in the London 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremony, directed by the leftwing Danny Boyle, who decided to celebrate the NHS as something distinctly British to be proud of.
It seems, given that universal health care is pretty much universal in the developed world (even the US has only had a small minority excluded from health care), a trifle odd. Setting aside the issues of the United States, there are no fundamental issues of access to health care elsewhere in the developed world, even though it is difficult to find other countries that adopt the NHS model - whereby the users never pay for anything (except nominal prescription, dental and optical services fees for some), where there is little choice of provider (your choice is dependent on where you live and you cannot travel to select a different primary health provider) and funding flows from a centrally planned and directed system to mostly state owned providers.
Since its launch in 1948, the NHS has grown to become the world’s largest publicly funded health service. It is also one of the most efficient, most egalitarian and most comprehensive.
If it does say so itself!
A core mantra is "the NHS remains free at the point of use for anyone who is resident in the UK". Setting aside the rather loose approach it takes to charging non-residents or
It's proud of its size, which it shouldn't be, as it speaks volumes about what is fundamentally wrong with it:
The NHS employs more than 1.7m people. Of those, just under half are clinically qualified...Only the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, the Wal-Mart supermarket chain and the Indian Railways directly employ more people
