Whatever the Americans (Republicans in particular) may think of the UK’s National Health Service, the Brits obviously love it – so much that when someone criticised it, they tweeted enough in defense of the NHS to bring Twitter down.
In an attempt to criticize the health care reforms suggested by the Barrack Obama team, Republican Sarah Palin commented that the British NHS did not value human life enough as it had put on an ‘Orwellian’ financial cap, and it left people to die.
She obviously could not have expected that her comments would have raised such a hue and cry among the Britishers.
Once these comments were publicized, several thousand British nationals, loyal to the NHS started tweeting on ‘#welovethenhs’. They commented on how the NHS had saved them or their loved ones from time to time, and about how good the scheme was, as it even took care of those who did not have the financial resources for their healthcare needs.
So much so, that even the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown felt compelled to comment on the issue through Twitter. His Tweet said, “NHS often makes the difference between pain and comfort, despair and hope, life and death. Thanks for always being there.
According to statistics available, more than 20,500 tweets have been sent out on the subject of the NHS, since it started on Wednesday, making it a ‘trending topic’.
The only drawback of topics becoming so popular on Twitter, is that unscrupulous users and spammers make use of these hashtags to spread false news and to attract attention to their own sites, and it possible that this may soon happen to ‘#welovethenhs’.
