My son’s been writing a speech on Aneurin Bevan that he has to give tomorrow. Hearing a nine year old talk about why free universal health care is a fundamental, civilising concept has been pretty inspiring.

He picked this quote: “no society can legitimately call itself civilised if a sick person is denied medical aid because of lack of means.”
— from In Place of Fear.

Bevan understood a truth that many Australian economists, commentators and talk show panellists have been articulating this week: economic downturns kill people all the time. Markets kill people all the time.

Unlike our contemporary commentators though, he understood that this isn’t an inevitability or a virtue. It’s a sign of social failure.

I really worry that in the post-COVID-19 era universal health care will be attacked by these same avaricious interests. They’ll describe it as a luxury we can’t afford – even though it’s one of the things that’s protected us through this time.

Anyway, read In Place of Fear. It’s pretty great for a 68 year old book https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.537058/page/n5/mode/2up