In a Split Second …

In a split second your life can change. From young fit & healthy to fighting for your life, dying and if you survive forever disabled.

That happened to me at the age of 18. Within a few hours of leaving home on a very nice warm sunny but otherwise ordinary day I was fighting for my life. On the tarmac of a busy road, bleeding to death from a severed artery, pieces of my own bone and flesh detached & scattered around me. 

Our wonderful NHS was there to save me. Unconditionally. No questions as to how I would pay. The NHS went on to repair me & set me on the road to recovery. 

This was there (still is as I write) for all, regardless of who you are or your means to pay, however many months or years that takes.

You would be recognised as disabled and helped to live your life with a very modest but vital financial safety net.

Some seem to despise the NHS. They will continually quote and exaggerate the mistakes that have occurred. I can only assume that these people have never been in the situation I describe above. What private healthcare company scrapes you up from the road and saves your life, there and then? No plush consulting room and small talk niceties. Just basic gory blood & guts urgency.

So maybe it’s me. But I have to speak out when I see folk knocking the NHS. I would not wish my experience at 18 on anybody. I hope those who hate the NHS so much never need it as I did. But those traffic bulletins that warn of ‘long delays due to an accident’, someone may be fighting for their life through no fault of their own on that road. So be patient and be thankful for the NHS who will (hopefully) be there for us all. 

Link to: Conscious throughout  

Originally Published on

8/22/13 5:55 PM