Sunday, April 15, 2007

Oh, the irony of it all…..

What happens if you are a Welsh person living in Wales but attend an English General Practitioner’s surgery just across the English border – and the Doc gives you a prescription?

Do you.....

A) Pay the near seven quid charge because you are making use of the English National Health Service – and everyone in England obviously has to pay for the medicine?

B) Decide to travel an extra 12 miles in the opposite direction to use a Welsh doctor’s services and thus qualify for free prescriptions – and at the same time lighten the burden on Hereford NHS Trust?

C) Moan, moan, moan, moan and moan so much that the Welsh Assembly cave in and give you a special entitlement card which will, upon presentation qualify you for free prescriptions?

Surprise, surprise, they went for option C .

So next time you sick people of Hereford are coughing and spluttering your way through a quick read of a well thumbed ‘People’s Friend’ in your local surgery and you get into conversation with the Welsh guy in the next seat – just remember who is getting the free prescriptions…..
(Even when they are using English services)

1 comment:

alistairphillips101 said...

from what i understand from the article you have linked to, even with an entitlement card you have to get your prescriptions from a welsh doctor or pharmacy.

Also worth noting is this:

lets say 100,000 people a week pick up a prescription which is now free :
thats an extra 3.5 million that the central NHS fund has to find, which quite frankly is ridiculous.

And is not sustainable, why should we expect things for free?