What You Get For Free 

VodkaPundit calls this column on WSJ required reading:

"Mr. Asman, could you come down to the gym? Your wife appears to be having a small problem." In typical British understatement, this was the first word I received of my wife's stroke.

We had arrived in London the night before for a two-week vacation. We spent the day sightseeing and were planning to go to the theater. I decided to take a nap, but my wife wanted to get in a workout in the hotel's gym before theater. Little did either of us know that a tiny blood clot had developed in her leg on the flight to London and was quietly working its way up to her heart. Her workout on the Stairmaster pumped the clot right through a too-porous wall in the heart on a direct path to the right side of her brain.

What follows is his account of the differences between public and private hospitals in Britain, compared to hospitals his wife then stayed at once they got back to the U.S. It's a pretty even handed column, with criticisms and applause given to both sides. What it boils down to, and I have said this before, is that socialized medicine is no perfect solution. You get what you pay for... and they pay a lot, even if it doesn't come in the form of a direct bill. But then again, the U.S. system has it's share of problems to. It's all about trade offs. Either way, the column is well worth the time to read.