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The WTO, health, and education <br> The Observer (London) <br> Sunday November 28, 1999 <br> World Trade Organisation: special report <br> ON THE EVE OF DESTRUCTION <br> <br> A new World Trade Organisation policy threatens the very heart of the National Health Service <br> By Will Hutton <br> <br> <br> States that USA could become an exporter of Health Care Insurance World wide. I wonder how that might happen? Perhaps a partnership and investment of the US government could create a new international business of health care insurance one we have public insurance ourselves. <br> The article and I quote:<br> An article published in the Lancet this weekend shows how the WTO is already committed to opening up the worlds public sector to international trade and foreign ownership if there is any degree of commercialisation, user-charging or partnership with the private sector. Transport and housing thus qualify in most countries, but so can health and education. What concerns the Lancet is that in Britain, where the use of the Private Finance Initiative and user-charging are far-advanced, we have created a degree of commercialisation of the public sector which means the rules of international free trade will have to govern our hospital service rather than the principles of free universal health care. A US multinational could take the NHS to the WTO disputes panel if it refused it permission to buy a PFI-financed British hospital. The world needs to govern its trade relationships, but what the protesters at Seattle are signalling is that the process is reaching the limits of its legitimacy. We need multinational trade rules, but they need to be part of an overall global economic architecture that is fairer and more balanced than this.
By Ken Congrove

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