We Are Not Amused

My sister asks why I have not blogged about my recent 30-hour sojourn in the belly of socialized medicine. It’s a good question. The thing is, I’m not sure I can accurately describe the experience of a Middle Eastern hospital to her or anyone else who hasn’t experienced it firsthand.

To start with, there is no such thing as a semi-private room. I was in a new ward so there were only four beds to a room instead of six. The bed itself was reclaimed from a Nottingham dungeon, consisting of metal strips on a frame topped with a thin mattress filled with lumpy pellets. But even if it had been comfortable, which it wasn’t, it would have been like trying to sleep in a bus station, there being also no such things as visiting hours. Everybody’s whole clan comes meandering through at any old time.

Then there was that one of my roommates who did not stop talking. Ever. Yes, she even talked in her sleep. For the first twelve hours or so we heard in minute detail how she cooks kebab, how she makes humus, where to buy the best pita – all of this to a roomful of fasting people in surgical ward. Then we heard replayed conversations with her daughter on clothes, where to park the car, her uncle’s business dealings with… Here I punctured my own eardrums. At one point I opened my eyes to find her standing at the foot of my bed wanting to know what was wrong with me. “How did you get that? What have you been lifting? Don’t you take care of yourself?” Only in the Middle East could you be expected to justify your life to a total stranger.

All of this would have been worth it, albeit annoying, if I had been treated. But I wasn’t. After being given an injection in the emergency room to stop my screaming, I was transferred to the ward where I was dumped on a bed and left. Eight hours later, a doctor wandered by, pushed on my stomach and left. I saw only one nurse on the ward and nobody would give me any information. The next day I was blithely told that they had no time to fix my problem and were sending me home. I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

But when the elevator doors opened on the ground floor I couldn’t believe what I saw: a mall! There were bookstores, drug stores, clothing stores, restaurants – civilization! There was even a MacDonald’s. Yes, MacDonald’s in a hospital. You can chow down on a Big Mac and then go right upstairs and take your chances on a triple bypass. It’s very efficient, probably the only thing in the place that is.

So you supporters of Obamacare, beware what you wish for. This is your future. Mine involves escaping to the Elysian Fields of private medicine where I expect to be treated like the Queen of England. I’ll let you know how that goes.