Gordon Brown joins Twitter campaign defending NHS
Professor Stephen Hawking refutes attacks in US newspaper by saying 'I wouldn't be here today without NHS'
Alexandra Topping and Hugh Muir
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 13 August 2009 13.55 BST
The prime minister, Gordon Brown, and his wife, Sarah, last night weighed in on the increasingly acrimonious debate over the NHS by joining a Twitter campaign defending the health service from attacks by US Republicans intent on derailing President Barack Obama's healthcare reforms.
The NHS has been labelled "evil" and "Orwellian" by Republicans and campaigners who claim it allows the elderly to die untreated. They argue deficiencies in the British system should act as warnings against the dangers of a "socialised" healthcare system.
Britons angry at the attacks have organised a campaign on the micro-blogging site, which has also been joined by the health secretary, Andy Burnham. The social networking site crashed yesterday with the volume of messages for the #welovethenhs campaign.
The site carried a message last night which said: "PM; NHS often makes the difference between pain and comfort, despair and hope, life and death. Thanks for always being there." It also included Sarah Brown stating "#welovethenhs — more than we can say".
Another message read: "Andy Burnham: Over the moon about strong support for NHS – an institution I will defend to my dying day."
Campaigners have wrongly claimed that NHS patients over the age of 59 cannot get heart surgery, women under 25 are "not allowed" breast cancer screening, and 40% of UK cancer patients do not have access to a specialist. Macmillan Cancer Support said this figure was 15 years out of date.
Professor Stephen Hawking also defended the NHS against claims by rightwing campaigners that he would "not have a chance in the UK".
The internationally renowned physicist set the record straight, telling the Guardian's diarist Hugh Muir that he had received a large amount of excellent treatment from the NHS. "I wouldn't be here today if it were not for the NHS," he said. "I have received a large amount of high-quality treatment without which I would not have survived."
Hawking, who has had motor neurone disease for 40 years and received NHS care at Addenbrooke's hospital in Cambridge as recently as April, was in Washington last night to receive America's highest civilian honour, the presidential medal of freedom.
A US newspaper, the Investor's Business Daily, used the occasion to point out so-called deficiencies in the UK health system. "The controlling of medical costs in countries such as Britain through rationing, and the health consequences thereof, are legendary. The stories of people dying on a waiting list or being denied altogether read like a horror script," the paper wrote.
It added: "People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn't have a chance in the UK, where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless."
