Roland Perry wrote:
In message 485aa265@qaanaaq, at 19:16:04 on Thu, 19 Jun 2008, Andy
Hall remarked:

The issue is really one of why is the NHS involved in the delivery
of dentistry at all.
Because it's part of your healthcare.

Except that the government is not delivering on its commitments. It
isn't possible to get good quality dentistry via th NHS.

It's entirely possible to get the same quality work as the same dentist
would charge you private rates for. Whether getting "even better" is
value for money is something only an individual can decide.

No, it isn't. A lot of the best quality stuff - like non amalgam
fillings etc - are not part of what teh ~NHS will pay for. Also, teh
time for a job which is done at 'fixed price' i terms of what teh NHS
patys, has to be done super fast to make any money at all. I dont WANT a
dentist rushing root canal work, an ending up with a bit of rotten root
abcessing away below my tooth. Been there, done that.


The same is true of almost all NHS services, the only difference with
dentistry is that it's harder to track down the good NHS dentists,
compared to good NHS GPs - but there are still a large number of NHS GPs
who can be easily bettered by going private, and yet few people bother.


The doctors in the NHS get paid better than te dentists dfor less work.

Indeed. The government should not be in service delivery except in a
very small number of examples such as the military. It should
restrict itself to funding only of a basic payment insurance scheme
and allow people to make their own service provider choices.

I've seen something like that in the USA, and it's appalling. From
almost every possible point of view.

I've seen something like that in e.g. Germany, and it works bloody well.