Interesting public debate on BBC News today about the state of dentistry in the United Kingdom. The state of dentistry in the UK has been on the slide for years, and most people don't have an NHS dentist who's accepting new patients anywhere near them. If you have an NHS dentist and decide to move, good luck in finding a new one!

I went private myself, and up here in the middle of nowhere, it works pretty well as it's quite cheap. For the poor so-and-so's stuck in the South East though, prices of up to £180 per checkup have been quoted, with many dentists switching to private only and encouraging their patients to subscribe to monthly plans instead. A lot of people mention that they travel over 100 miles to visit a dentist, with some saying they travel to Eastern Europe to get better treatment.

The problem is in expectations. We've come to assume that we're paying for a health system in the UK through our taxes, when in reality we're propping up a semi-free hospital and GP service at a cost of tens of billions of pounds each year. The rest of the 'system' is reasonably autonomous and becoming rapidly privatised without our government really admitting it. Let's ditch the 'free' health system entirely, free up some cash in the national budget, and move to a semi-privatised insurance based health system with all the checks and balances like the French did.

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