Chris

Given the chaotic and limited role government plays in healthcare in the USA, is it worthwhile even discussing it with relation to the U.K.?

Remember also that only the Westminster parliament is sovereign. Powers are devolved to Scotland and Wales and if a crisis became sufficiently acute they could be exercised directly by the U.K. government if authorised to do so by the U.K. parliament. Even under present arrangements the devolved administrations depend on central emergency funding and on scientific advice that may be delivered in Edinburgh and London but is given by experts who are in regular contact, who are drawing from the same research and whose advice (and any action taken on it) is readily comparable. They also depend on U.K. government decision making and control in situations where the devolved administrations require military assistance.

This crisis has allowed Sturgeon in Edinburgh and whatever that goon in Cardiff is called to strut about and look far more important and influential than they actually are, but in reality they’re all paying for the party out of the same bank account and there’s barely a hair’s breadth of a difference between the decisions they’re taking; almost all the differences amount to timing that befits local differences, and in any case there are now examples of local differences in regulations within England and Scotland.