Great Britain's National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE)has put strict limits on painkilling injections for back pain sufferers.
If the cause of back pain is unknown, doctors are ordered to offer patients remedies like acupuncture and osteopathy. This could lead thousands of people to suffer excruciating pain if they can't afford expensive private treatment, but could save the National Health Service (NHS) 33 million pounds per year.
The British Pain Society maintains that many patients will end up undergoing risky and unnecessary surgery under the NICE guidelines. Or they could end up addicted to opiate drugs. Society members are so outraged that they have removed Dr. Paul Watson, who helped write the guidelines, from the Presidency of their organization..
Cancer patients in the UK have it even worse. Only 1 in 5 doctors tell these patients about drugs that could prolong their lives, but that aren't approved by the NHS because of their high cost. The cost of a drug is compared with the time it could prolong life. If it is too high, you don't get it. Doctors fear telling patients they could live longer, but only if they can come up with a lot of cash.
This could easily be happening in the USA in a few years. The President supports a national health board to make decisions on our medical care. The wild 'stimulus' spending occurring now will mean cost-saving measures will be necessary.
The stimulus we need is the mandate that Congress must enroll in any new national health plan they decide to pass.
