A Ship Made of Paper

An unforeseen health scare and stay in the hospital in today’s Camino a Ítaca. Public healthcare systems around the world are under attack and without extreme vigilence, many countries could soon wind up like the United States. All’s it takes is a vote in the right direction. Click over to read originally published version in Spanish or read the English translation below. (PDF en castellano abajo)

We were looking out the wide picture windows when my friend Jill turned to me and said, “It’s like we’re on an ocean liner but instead of the sea we’re sailing across dehesa and golden steppe.” And it was true the modernist building sort of projected itself over the savannah-like landscape towards the fringe of blueish mountains in the distance.

The view was extraordinarily beautiful, but the situation certainly wasn’t. I had been admitted to the new hospital in Caceres with something rather serious and painful and I had been taking refuge for several days in my incredible view from the area where you would have expected to see another patient’s bed as I awaited the results of test after test. The thoroughness and professionality of the entire staff was truly remarkable. The camaraderie and the general care was outstanding. Their pride in their work showed in every little thing they did.

“I immediately fell in love with this landscape on the train ride in more than thirty years ago,” Jill recalled, “it’s as far away from my northern English moors that you can get, but it still gave me a similar peace.” And I knew exactly what she meant, the view outside the window was an entirely different landscape from that I grew up with seeing the great plains of Canada running off towards the immense pine forests that crowd the skirts of the Rocky Mountains, but there was some sort of symbiosis between the three open landscapes.

Spain does so many things well, from its gastronomy, to sport, to its tolerance and generosity. There are so many things that this country can be proud of. But perhaps one of its most impressive achievements is something that many simply take for granted: its healthcare system. Spain punches above its weight in many things, like its patrimony and tourism, but it’s its healthcare system that few, if any country can challenge.

And that’s what confuses me.

So much national indignation is immediately raised when there is a perceived slight towards an institution the nation cherishes,like when someone abroad throws chorizo inwith their paella. But where is this damaged pride, this generalized outrage at the clear and ongoing attempts to dismantle the public healthcare system?

It takes a special kind of evil to provoke conflicts and sell arms to each side, privatize access to water or sabotage public healthcare systems, but I hope there is an even more special place in purgatory designated for public officials who deliberately underfund public institutions to justify their gradual privatization.

But how do they get away with this?

Simple really. People don’t necessarily vote in their own interests. They lead more with their identity and their desire to be associated with an elite who can afford private care. It’s intertwined with that instinctual conservative aversion to the word public, to the idea that someone they believe ‘inferior’ to them can actually enjoy the same rights.

Jill and I both knew about the disaster that continual cutbacks and privatization brought about in our respective countries. It’s time to make the healthcare system the new paella and defend it with the same energy and zeal.