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But none relating to payment or ability to pay. In the UK, medications are dispensed without checking whether a person is eligible for free prescriptions. Anyone can collect a prescription medication without paying by claiming an exemption (e.g. being on low income, pregnant, etc.) without proof. The pharmacist can also waive the £9 fee for a prescription. There's never a situation where not being able to figure out the paperwork prevents medicine being available.

The prescription system itself could be compromised, in which case everyone in society would face the same issue (which would be mediated by the fact that paper prescriptions are still produced, and a pharmacist can telephone a prescribing surgery). Only a supply chain attack would really cripple the system.

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Presumably even in a single-payer system, you still need just as good of an accounting of costs and care provided. The data needs are all still there, just fewer parties are transacting.

Absolutely. But in the UK, Ireland, Germany, New Zealand, etc... nobody would be refused their medicine because the payment system didn't work. Even if the computers didn't work.

In the USA, people can and do die because there's a financial barrier to accessing medicine. Not so in countries that care about people.

> But in …Germany…etc... nobody would be refused their medicine because the payment system didn't work. Even if the computers didn't work.

If the computers didn’t work, it would be incredibly painful in Germany because most pharmacies don’t regularly stock most prescription drugs. They’re often ordered from central warehouses on demand - i.e. if you walk in with a prescription for Xanax in the morning, you’ll typically need to come back in the afternoon to pick it up.

That ordering process is entirely digital. If you suddenly switched to paper forms, phone calls, and faxes, it’d be a nightmare.

I have never experienced that problem. I've had my prescriptions filled without having to wait for stock dozens of times in Berlin.

It's not really a "problem" because you can usually get them the same day, but I can assure you that it's a thing, especially if you take controlled medications like Methylphenidate.

An even more fun quirk is that because different pharmacies seem to use different distributors, you'll sometimes have to hop around until you find one whose distributor has whatever your medication is in stock. I once had to go to four different pharmacies in Mitte before I found one that could order Zolpidem.

Methylphenidate is exactly what I take - strange and interesting that we have opposite experiences, but in Xberg I never had a problem

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