Invented immediately after World War II, Britain's National Health Service (NHS) served as an inspiration for many countries which wanted to create a universal, state-funded health-care system.
Yet, to the amazement of politicians in London, their cherished institution has now been dragged into a vicious political debate in the United States.
Opponents of President Barack Obama's health-care reform proposals have accused the White House of seeking to copy the British model, complete with its alleged 'Orwellian bureaucracy', its 'rationing' of health care and its supposed willingness to let older people die in order to save money.
The criticisms have elicited a fierce bipartisan response from British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and opposition leader David Cameron. They both have interrupted their summer holidays in order to defend their country's reputation.
As is often the case in such debates, facts are not allowed to interfere with prejudices. Yet facts do matter, for they paint a nuanced picture. Simply put, Britain's health-care system is nowhere near as bad as some Americans believe, and it is hardly anywhere near as perfect as British politicians claim.
The NHS is a bureaucratic monster. It is the biggest single employer in Europe and the third largest employer in the world - after China's People's Liberation Army and US retailer Wal-Mart. It is also heavily centralised.
Nor is it 'free', as ordinary Britons often say. The institution is funded through a tax levy which, on average, removes 10 per cent of a worker's salary. There is no way of opting out. Even those who have health insurance and wish to be treated in private hospitals still have to pay the levy.
The NHS devours 17.5 per cent of Britain's annual fiscal budget, almost as much as defence and education combined.
Is it worth it? The World Health Organisation (WHO) places Britain's health-care system in the 18th place in a global league of health-care systems. The US system is ranked 37th. Average life expectancy is one year longer in Britain, compared with the US. And all of this is achieved while spending far less than the US on a per capita basis.
To be sure, the US leads the world in high-tech surgery, and particularly in some cancer treatments, where the British record remains appalling.
To take just one example: At the moment, there are three pioneering ways of treating prostate cancer in the US. Two of these are unavailable in Britain, and the third is very hard to get.
However, the explanation for this discrepancy is obvious: As prostate cancer affects middle-aged men who pay most of the insurance premiums, US health companies have every reason to invest heavily in tackling it.
Nevertheless, when it comes to chronic illnesses such as diabetes, which require lengthy treatment, the British model would appear to be better, precisely because it is not driven by profit.
The biggest and most emotive dispute just now is over the concept of rationing, the allegation that Britain's NHS would either refuse to keep alive those who are too old or simply not treat those who need very expensive medication.
There is no such policy. Yet, in reality, a rationing system does exist.
For example, Britain operates a National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence - or Nice, as it calls itself, with an eye to good publicity.
Theoretically, Nice is supposed to just evaluate new drugs and surgical methods in order to determine whether these are safe and efficient. But it does more than that: It refuses to authorise any drug that will cost more than S$65,000 per life year gained.
Of course, the figure is arbitrary and, for those whose life is terminated as a result, a tragedy.
Nevertheless, as Nice chairman Michael Rawlings recently pointed out: 'All health-care systems have implicitly, if not explicitly, adopted some form of cost control.'
In the US, rationing also exists, albeit differently. Insurance companies routinely exclude certain illnesses from the coverage of their patients, or simply refuse to insure those who are too risky or too old.
The real question which Americans should ask themselves is what kind of rationing is worse - that of Britain, which may deprive its people of some of the latest technological innovations, or that of the US, where roughly 45 million citizens have no proper coverage at all?
Ordinary Americans would also do well to ponder why their country spends twice as much on health care as the rest of the industrialised world, but enjoys no better overall results.
Mr David Hannan, a British MP, had the courage to argue earlier this week that the US should blend the NHS model with that of Singapore - sixth on the WHO ranking - 'where people can opt out of a state-run system and into health savings accounts, giving them more choice'.
Yet Mr Hannan's intervention was dismissed by the entire British political elite as either unpatriotic or just eccentric.
So both sides of the Atlantic still agree on at least one point: Myths about the alleged superiority of their existing health-care systems remain more important than reality. By Jonathan Eyal, Straits Times Europe Bureau. ST20/8/09
