TY - JOUR T1 - Intelligence squared? Regrettably not JF - British Journal of General Practice JO - Br J Gen Pract SP - 878 LP - 879 VL - 54 IS - 508 AU - Iona Heath Y1 - 2004/11/01 UR - http://bjgp.org/content/54/508/878.abstract N2 - This was a dreadful event. It was arranged by the mysterious Intelligence2 and, on my way, I wondered what kind of self-selecting participants would be attracted to such an organisation and such an event. My heart sank as soon as I took my seat. The audience oozed affluence and could hardly have been more demographically different from those who congregate in the waiting room of our practice in Kentish Town. I listened to the conversation behind me, which involved a discussion of the relative merits of famous schools purveying prestigious private education. Clearly the view was that state education was broken and beyond repair —what hope could there be for the beleaguered NHS?The only glimmer in the gloom was the comforting discovery that not one of the team proposing the motion was prepared to attack openly the original guiding principle of the NHS — universal accessible health care. The problem was that, this out of the way, there was little left to debate other than the relative merits of private provision within the umbrella of the NHS.The proposers opened with Kenneth Minogue, … ER -