As the American health care debate gets crushed under the load of untruths generally spoken by folks for whom a visit to a foreign land would be as unsavory as kissing a worn and leaky sweat sock full of live squid, I thought maybe now—when it’s too late—we’d gently speak of some reality because it’s so…um, cathartic, really.
If you’ve never visited Europe, you probably live under the assumption that a plethora of stinking dead folks can always be found stacked like cordwood next to hospitals built out of wattle-and-daub and manned, if you don’t mind a sexist word hurled at you now and again, by native witch doctors whose curative powers consist entirely of sticking pins in dolls until at some point—when the patient has managed to live longer than the government wants—he is shoved rudely out of the way by a government agent (dressed all in black and lugging a big canister of poisoned gas with its mask dangling and scraping against the earthen floor like the tail of a godless beast) who sidles up to the patient and, grinning wickedly, slaps the mask tightly upon said patient’s face and watches gleefully as he struggles like a stuck pig before giving in to what the government wants.
Well, it ain’t like that.
You might actually be surprised at the fact that if you get sick while touring Europe, doctors often come to you. They probably won’t charge you, either. Then, if you have a tiny complaint, you might be surprised that you can just up and go to the farmacia or pharmacy and the pharmacist might be able to give you what you need without going through a doctor. And whatever that medicine is, it is probably cheaper than you could get it in the US. Yes, Pharmacists are educated people, and in the US that education is almost entirely wasted.
Not to mention that Italians live longer then Americans and have a much better infant mortality rate.
But heck, if you want to know what’s actually going on with civilized medicine in Italy today, why not check in with a journalist who lives there? Someone who’ll give you some facts on the issue for once? See Sari Gilbert’s Editorial: health care from the European point of view
Now, you might be tempted to say, “Yeah, but civilized medicine is expensive!” Well, you might want to read Civilized Medicine about the “unbelievably high” cost of health care in France. Health care in Italy? If I said I pay less than $400 a year would that be too much for full coverage?