'Government lights the fuse for privatisation' blazed the Health visitor journal's front cover when the NHS and Community Care Act was passed in 1990. Since then the debate on the future of the NHS has raged. In the first of a series in which different authors look at policy issues, Allyson Pollock argues that the introduction of charges for dentistry, eye tests and long-term care--is undermining the principle of a universal national healthcare service, free at the point of use.
