You're sick? Good luck.

A comment left on Meg McArdle's post on "The Magic of Europe," in which Meg claims that health care is better overall in Europe than here. The commenter responds:

Maybe if you're poor, definitely not if you've got any money. My wife and I have developed an expression: If you're not sick enough to go to A&E (the emergency room), you're well enough to wait and see an American doctor. Every encounter with our British GP has been met with "Yep, you look sick alright. Good luck with that." I went to the after hours GP once because I had strep throat so painful that I couldn't sleep for two days. The doctor looked at my throat. Didn't test me. Said I "maybe" had a "mild case" of strep throat and should go home and gargle salt water.

We have had good experiences when we can get past the first line of doctors though. Recently our son had a 104 degree temperature. (If you don't have a child to test this on, at this temperature they have to basically be kept naked and wiped with a damp rag constantly, or else they'll have seizures. If you're lucky, they'll just pass out.) We took him to the British GP who said he "seemed" sick, but given his non-specific symptoms there wasn't anything he could do. He told us to come back in three days if he still had a fever. We went to the base clinic the next day. They had us go immediately to the childrens' ward at the NHS hospital. The doctors and nurses there actually seemed concerned, and took great care of us until he got better.

But don't worry, American nationalized health care will be completely different.

Then there's this report from England: "The babies born in hospital corridors: Bed shortage forces 4,000 mothers to give birth in lifts, offices and hospital toilets."