Grandmother Dies Because She Bought Her Own Meds

According to every liberal (and some misguided conservatives), this will never happen here. But I still think you should know how the government run health care system in Great Britain refused treatment to a grandmother suffering from cancer. She actually thought she had a right to buy her own meds.

How…free market:

Mrs O’Boyle, 64, had been receiving state-funded treatment - including chemotherapy - for colon cancer.

But when she took cetuximab, a drug which promised to extend her life but is not available on the NHS, her health trust made her start paying for her care.

Mrs O’Boyle, an NHS occupational therapist, is believed to be the first person to die after being denied free care because of ‘co-payment’, where a patient tops up treatment by paying privately for extra drugs.

Co-payment was blocked last year by Health Secretary Alan Johnson because he claimed it would create a two-tier Health Service.

So, why wouldn’t NHS just give her the cetuximab so she didn’t have to create this “two-tier system?” Cost.

…her consultant recommended-Cetuximab, which could extend her life. But it is available on the NHS only in Scotland, not in England and Wales.

It is one of many medicines the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence denies to some patients because of cost.

Mrs O’Boyle’s decision to take it meant she and her husband had to spend £11,000 over two months for care from Southend University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.

Mr O’Boyle, an NHS manager for 30 years, said: ‘I think every drug should be available to all of us if there’s a need for that drug to be used.

‘I offered to pay for it but was told I couldn’t continue with the treatmentwe were receiving at the hospital-The consultant was flabbergasted - he was very upset.’

He added: ‘I was always very anti private treatment. But everything she had wasn’t working and it was a last resort.

He almost sounds apologetic, like he’s explaining to all the socialists why he strayed outside of the collective.

One more quote from the article, but it’s a doozy:

Medical experts say the ban on co-payment is one reason why Britain has one of the worst survival rates for cancer in Europe.

Michael Moore, call your office.