Over the past several months, there has been a growing focus on the horrific neglect of patients within the Department of Veterans Affairs health care system, especially reports of veterans dying while on “secret” treatment waiting lists. Tragically, such stories are inevitable when government is running health care.

Of all the world’s health care systems, the VA’s regime most closely resembles Britain’s National Health Service, the subject of an October cover story in the Washington Examiner. Like the NHS, the VA medical system is a centralized bureaucracy with a network of government-run hospitals overseen by public officials and employing doctors who are paid by the government.