Depends on your luck

What if I told you today that you that you have a rare form of cancer but sadly there is nothing I can do in helping you treat it other than end of life care and hope for the best. What if I tend told you that when you went home, you learn on Facebook a friend of yours also has this cancer but have a new treatment that will treat it.

If I was you I would be thinking “What the hell!?, is that private?” but that is exactly what is happening today in the United Kingdom and that is a game we like to call – “The Postcode Lottery”.

Although we now live in the 21st century and a universal health care across the country that will give treatment to anyone (even those that come to the UK illegally) without any questions ask, getting life saving treatment such as for cancer all depends on where you live and if the local NHS Trust believe it is worth paying for it. Basically what is happening in the United Kingdom when it comes to the National Health Service is that the “poor areas” have the largest amount of crap doctor practices are within those areas.

In other words if you live in a “rich area” there is a very good chance you are going to have a good doctor with funding. If you live in a poor area, well sucks to be you. I do find it near unbelievable, but not to understand, why when it comes to health care there should even be a “lottery” in the first place. Why can’t it be dealt with that if you need a certain treatment, the NHS will pay for it and not the local practice that has to decide if it wants to keep that money to either build a new office or to treat people (the doctor practice near where I live did indeed build a new office out of funding given by the NHS).

Now as I said above, lets ask that question again. Imagine you have cancer. Why should someone else in a different area might offer the best treatment – even treatment that may deal with it completely such as with neuroblastoma treatment while you are given cheapest option and if you are lucky, end of life care simply because the people in charge does not want to pay for the best possible treatment. This is the problem when there is a limited pot for each area, doctors have to decide what is more worth payment for and if you live in a poor area with a lot of people you can be sure that you will be given the cheapest option.

Makes you wonder really why they still call this place Great Britain where simple treatment is purely based on where you live.