Has the NHS bitten off more than it can chew?

The enamel which coats our teeth is the hardest substance in the human body. It carries a rank of five on the Mohs hardness scale – steel and iron come in at a mere four by comparison – and has a Young’s modulus of 83 Gpa (which is a better stress to strain ratio than Kevlar). Nobody ever dies of tooth decay. No, it is always some other, weak and soft part of the body that gives up first.

Why then do we insist twice a year that a man armed to the teeth with sharpened screwdrivers poke around in our mouths when it is obvious that the pearly choppers will outlast everything else by about 50,000 years? Think about it. You wouldn’t go to the doctor bi-annually demanding a full and comprehensive service. Probably because you would be dismissed as a time wasting half-wit: “Come on, doc, there’s nothing obviously wrong but I want X-Rays, blood tests, urine samples, MRI scans, electrocardiograms. Oh, and then I want to see the matron, who will polish my plums with Dettol.” Instead, we visit the doctor only when something is wrong, and this is how it should be at the dentist.

I was therefore surprised to read recently that the effective cost of the NHS works out to be roughly £2,000 per annum for every man, woman and child in the UK. And seeing as this money comes largely from taxation, in the form of income tax and National Insurance, the average taxpayer ends up contributing slightly more in addition to this amount.

As students, it is very tempting to ignore this figure due to it being rather irrelevant at present. But once in full-time employment, if you are one of the many people in this country who seeks medical attention fewer times a year than you frequent the realms of Dr. De Kay, then eventually you resent such a significant payout. Now I know that in some cases unfortunate circumstance means that money paid in will equal treatment received, but the vast majority of people end up going the way of the Dodo quietly, whilst watching re-runs of _Countdown_, or asleep.

Many must thus end up paying for a service which they never use, which means some are getting away with a highly reduced rate. Something surely needs to be done in order to ensure the scheme remains equal and fair to all those who deserve to receive the benefits. The Coalition certainly seems to believe that part of the solution might be found in transferring power and funds directly to groups of GPs who will take responsibility for buying health services from hospitals and other providers.

Yet this might not be quite extreme enough to cut the deficit and solve the underlying issues. Instead, Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg could try introducing variable National Insurance payments dependent upon the lifestyle choices made by each taxpaying individual – assuming there is a proven link between the activity and any negative effects. So if someone decides they would like to continue smoking: fine. They merely have to pay a higher premium. The plan is literally flawless; it has the potential to solve such plagues as obesity or motorcycling. There could even be a ‘double-or-nothing’ system whereby you have the option of either pay the higher premium or else continue contributing the same as a typical ‘healthy’ person, with the catch being you must foot the entire medical bill in the event of a related illness.

Until this vision becomes a reality though, I feel it only right that we all take advantage of the system we currently have. For that reason, once I finish this article, I am going to go out, break my leg, accidentally burn my hand, give myself concussion and then finally contract flu from a sneezing stranger. I might even try and chip a tooth.