RUTHFULLY YOURS

For obvious reasons, American politicians seeking an even greater federal role in U.S. health care avoid discussing the staggering privations under Marxist regimes in places like Cuba and Venezuela. Instead, pols like Sen. Bernie Sanders (socialist, Vt.) point to government-run health systems within largely free, developed economies. But the U.K. is another example they’ll want to avoid.

Josephine Franks reports for Sky News that senior doctors, called consultants in Britain, will be joining their less experienced colleagues in withholding treatment:

Consultants and junior doctors are set to strike for several more days this week and early next month, bringing more chaos to the NHS after several months of walkouts and delayed appointments…

A health chief said the NHS is in “uncharted territory” due to the strikes, with thousands of patient appointments expected to be cancelled.

Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, said this week’s strike action “can’t become the status quo”.

Sadly it can. If there’s one brutal lesson of government-run health care it’s that things can always get worse. Turning doctors into unionized government bureaucrats brings a host of problems, including the fact that politicians, not patients, decide what doctors are paid. This is of course a problem in the U.S. as well. England is a sort of preview of just how badly government management can mangle the incentives to provide medical services—and the duty to provide care. Ms. Franks continues:

On the picket lines of the March strike, junior doctors told Sky News why they were striking and described having to borrow money off family for medical exams, watching colleagues leave for better paid jobs abroad and how they were struggling to pay rent.

If anyone asks Mr. Sanders to comment, no doubt he will rail about the British government not spending enough, just as his answer to every question about U.S. health care involves a greater burden on taxpayers and fewer free choices for consumers.

But adopting the Sanders model for decades in the U.K. has led to a system that is now in constant crisis, with a plague of cancelled appointments and procedures. Jane Kirby reports in the Independent that “the NHS Confederation, which represents all NHS organisations, said increasing numbers of patients, including cancer patients, are seeing their appointments rescheduled more than once due to strikes.” Ms. Kirby adds:

Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the organisation, said: “This is likely to be the biggest walkout the NHS has ever seen, will cause serious disruption, and put patients at the highest level of risk in living memory…”

Don’t say you weren’t warned.