The NHS should be privatised

I have extensive experience as a user of both the NHS and the German health system. I think most on here are aware of how the NHS works, so I'll try and give some examples of how the German system works (to the best of my knowledge. The numbers may not be 100% accurate, but they give a good indication)
In Germany, everyone has to have health insurance. There are two levels, the government run health insurance or private insurance. If you earn under 40,000 euros a year then you have to be in the government insurance scheme. After 40,000 you can then transfer to a private scheme, or stay with the government one if you so wish. The government one is cheaper, but you do tend to get faster and better care with the private schemes. 
Government Health Insurance costs are about 15% of your salary. The more you earn, the more you pay, up to a certain limit. The unemployed obviously get their's paid by the government. I'm not sure about the cost of Private Insurance but I believe it's about 50% higher.
You have to additionally pay for subscriptions, with 5 euro being the base costs per item although a higher charge is levied for higher priced stuff.
All health care providers are private. All hospital's, ambulances, dentist's, opticians etc etc. The government do not run any health services.
The government strictly control the costs. The insurance companies just cannot charge whatever they want. Like in the UK, the government have a health budget. The government insurance company have to work within that budget meaning costs do not spiral out of control. This also means that there is a certain amount of competition between government and private schemes as if the private get too expensive, then people will stop using them and just use the government scheme.

In both the NHS and the German system, the food is terrible.
From my experience, UK hospitals are in better shape than German hospitals in terms of staffing, equipment and general decor of the hospitals.
Both systems rely heavily on staff from abroad. I don't think I've ever spoken to a single German nurse in hospital. The doctor who performed my heart work was Russian.
In Germany, hospitals are there to fix people. If you want to see a Heart specialist, or lung specialist, maybe it's easier to just say a specialist, you then visit them at their surgeries. No need to go anywhere near a hospital.

Germany is an insurance based health care system, the UK isn't.
Germany has a Gold Standard health care service. The UK doesn't.
In Germany you know exactly what you are paying for health care as it is there on your wage slip.
In the UK you have no idea how much you're paying.

I am not saying anything is right or wrong, just giving my views based on my experience and what I know. When it comes to insurance based health care don't get dragged into the old argument about the US style. 
In the UK, maybe someone earning more than, let's say, 100k a year MUST have private insurance and not have access to the 'free' NHS? Why should millionaires get their ingrown toe nails treated for free, if you get my drift.
The 'free at point of service' is a bit of a myth though. The NHS is not free. 

Front line care is still excellent in my experience but there are obviously inefficiencies and issues in various areas which inevitably point towards a degree of privatisation if the NHS cannot fix itself.
Should the state fund IVF? How much is wasted on health tourism?

I can’t recall the date the NHS came into being but the comparison between then and now is astonishing. During regular hospital appointments and procedures in both Southmead and the Bristol Heart Institute it staggers me the amount of hi-tech equipment being used - large scanners must cost millions for example. Compare that to back in the day when it was just nurses with a bottle of penicillin! Those wanting a Gold Star health service completely funded by the state with an ageing population and free support to foreign nationals are just completely deluded.

Privatise the NHS and let financial natural selection do the rest. It'll cut down on those scabby poor people who can't afford health care. Bloody peasants.

Everyone has health care in Germany, and it is insurance based and all private. Don't get sucked into the false narrative that insurance based systems are all like the US.

I think Nobby, if you wish to continue to make personal jibes, (relentlessly, like some tantric chant on acid) you might not want to water through your own doorway.
The world bank figures are for the total spend on health care regardless of origin and method. Take the USA, you don't think that the government there actually spends over 17% of gdp from tax revenues do you?

Perhaps you do, didn't you claim recently you were looking at share valuations on a company? The mind boggles.

Taking TOTAL  spend as a % of gdp ignores the method of source of funding, thus removing anomalies. Leaving the political will and ideology in sharp relief

Do you know how we compare to others in respect of state benefits? Sickness, unemployment, housing benefit etc.....

Unemployed or those ill have their insurance paid by the government. Children are not subsidised as such, as my son is automatically covered via my health insurance. Nobody is missed out.

According to the figures I posted above, Germany spends $1,300 more per head. I agree that it is also how it is spent but by most metrics, Germany spends a decent amount more.