What does “private” mean? A reflection on iTromsø’s report of 29/04/24, with the right-wing politicians Henriksen and Ingebrigtsen.
The debate about private health care is a recurring theme in the political debate. Often it is led with slogans that are embraced on one political side and detested on the other. For some, the term “welfare profiteer” is distasteful. For others, the term “all good forces” is a cover-up that covers up a lack of qualified labour. So far, I have not seen anyone bring up what the term “private” means.
Large Norwegian encyclopedia online gives this meaning in private: “Private is used for something that belongs to, pertains to or emanates from a single citizen or individual citizens and not from the state, the municipality or a public institution” (https://snl.no/privat).
The municipal and specialist health service is financed by our taxes. It is not private. I have not heard or read that any politicians from the Right want a “private healthcare system” where the patient (the end user) pays for it themselves. Probably what they, and also Ingebrigtsen and Henriksen, want is an “operating privatisation”. If the same source says:
“In Norwegian […] welfare policy, the dispute over privatization is mainly about operational privatisation. The political debate then concerns who should deliver services, while the public sector pays and is responsible for the services” (https://snl.no/privatisering).
Such a model is perfectly legitimate to want. The question is whether we as a society would benefit from a privatized healthcare system where commercial institutions deliver the healthcare service and the public (our taxes) finance and are responsible for it?
To approach On that topic, I would like to point out that Sebastian Henriksen in iTromsø makes a statement (I take into account that he may be misrepresented) about sick leave, and then he introduces something new, “private health insurance”.
To the first, Henriksen points out, sick leave. Many people (including me) have experienced musculoskeletal problems that have led to long sick leave. Some of this can be solved with day surgery or outpatient treatment. But not everything. Some will require calm and time and a complex investigation and treatment. Will a fragmented operating privatized offer be able to provide a holistic offer?
So it was “private health insurance”. If an insurance company buys a health service, it is the company that pays for it, not the public sector. But I don’t think it has such a large scale that hospitals like Aleris can make money from it? Here there are enough deadlines for day surgery and free choice of hospital for some services, which is the business model. So it’s not private. Operations are privatized where the commercial company gets a profit, but the public sector bears the responsibility and expenses.
The term “all good “forces” has been loosely in the mouths of right-wing politicians for the past decade, but it is not often uttered anymore, because even among them there has been a growing recognition that the demand for qualified health personnel is greater than the supply.
Personnel shortage is not been solved with operational privatization until now. Do Henriksen and Ingebrigtsen believe that such an ideological model is the best for our municipality, for our society? Or should we invest in further developing the pragmatic model we now have, where the public (we) is responsible for our common welfare – school, research and health, or should this be privatized?
