The article outline that 1 in 10 people in the UK have done DIY emergency dental care, wich suggests strongly that the availability is less good than advertised. In fact a large portion of the article is about growing NHS wait times.
Now 600 people is a lot smaller than 60 million, I don't doubt there are people who have pulled a tooth out, but to get those sorts of figures, you'd have to count all the kids who pull out a tooth with a bit of string to get £1 from the tooth fairy.
This isn't a correct characterization of US healthcare either. No one is denied lifesaving care due to inability to pay by law. In fact 92% of Americans have some kind of health insurance. Of the ~8% who are uninsured, yes many do defer routine medical care which may lead to adverse long term effects. Its a real problem. However ~70% of the uninsured are eligible for Medicaid, subsidy, or employer insurance, so there's room to improve on getting those people signed up.
Unlike the NHS.
> However ~70% of the uninsured are eligible for Medicaid, subsidy, or employer insurance, so there's room to improve on getting those people signed up.
I’d love if our government saw “room to improve” there instead of doing the exact opposite and working overtime to reduce the number of fully insured people.