Originally posted by SueEllen
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Anyway, I don't need the advice of the government or any charity to know that I shouldn't live on a diet of pizza & chips.
Unfortunately life doesn't work like that - you can eat as healthily and exercise as much as you want but if you got screwed genes or have say something like asthma you are going to need medical care.
If you eat healthily and exercise sensibly then statistically you're chances of needing expensive treatment are much lower and that will be recognized by the insurance company when they're quoting me a premium.
Equally, if I race motorbikes and base-jump I'm statistically much more likely to need treatment and the insurance company will recognize that too when quoting my premium, while deciding that the odds of me being run over by a bus aren't any higher than anyone else's and so ignoring that small risk.
If I'm born with bad genes which will make my premiums expensive through no action of my own, then so be it. There is nothing prohibiting people taking out family cover which guarantees that children born with conditions will be covered to some extent; families will pay a premium for this, such is the nature of offsetting the risk of something that may or may not happen.
Alternatively there's always a place for charity. The NHS is just charity obtained by force in instances where the donator is unwilling. I would bet that people in general would be ALOT more willing to fund a healthcare scheme in which recipients of treatment did so only in order to treat such disorders - and not to treat self-inflicted disease or injury.
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