Well, it seems to me all the hand-wringing about waiting lists, etc., is overblown right-wing propaganda -- not that the systems don't have problems or that this doesn't happen, but I don't think it's as bad as all that.  I've never known of one of my relatives who didn't get the medical care they needed in Britain.  

My nephew once had to wait two weeks for allergy testing, but otoh, I recently had to wait three weeks to get an appointment with a GI doc.  I don't see a lot of difference between those waits, except one was called a "waiting list" and the other was called "all booked up."

My reading of Metatone's comment was that coverage doesn't always mean coverage for everything.  There's no denying that this is indeed the case with many insurance plans here in the U.S.  Of course, there are hundreds of plans, so I'm sure there are many examples of the system working really well, but especially with HMOs, there are countless hurdles and exclusions and ways to disqualify a person from getting needed treatment.

Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes