Quality of health care in Israel puts the UK to shame

With local hospitals being closed at dizzying speed, and medical resources cut, Haringey residents might be interested in the following story.

My brother-in-law lives in Israel in a suburb of Tel Aviv very similar to Haringey. Last Tuesday he felt faint and visited his doctor on a non-emergency basis. Despite the lack of panic, he was seen on the same day he requested an apppointment. The doctor diagnosed blocked coronary arteries and sent his patient to hospital. Early in the morning of the next day -- that is, less than

24 hours after the doctor's appointment -- my brother-in-law underwent a bypass operation. After six days on the coronary ward, he had the choice of going home or to a dedicated convalescent unit for two weeks to receive diet advice, physiotherapy and other remedial treatments. He chose the convalescent unit and was told that his wife or brother would be welcome to stay in the second bed in his double room, to keep him company. My brother-in-law is not a wealthy man, has no special health insurance and does not live in a privileged part of town.

Israel is a country under the double stress of perpetual assault from her neighbours, as well as absorbing hundreds of thousands of impoverished eastern Europe immigrants who have swelled the population from about 4 million to about 5 1/2 million within the past 10 years.

Can anyone here in Haringey even imagine the possibility of being offered a post-operative convalescent facility, still less of having your nearest and dearest to stay there with you? Can anyone even imagine getting a doctor's appointment on the same day of asking for one? I would be interested to hear any theories as to why such prompt, humane and rational medical attention is possible there and so completely impossible here.

Lydia Rivlin,

Deputy Chairman,

Tottenham Conservatives,