LONDON (Reuters) - Over 2,000 patients died in hospitals last year because of accidents and errors, about half of which could have been avoided if lessons from previous accidents had been learnt, a report said on Thursday.

There were just under 1 million patient safety incidents or near misses in 2004/2005 which were estimated to cost the National Health Service (NHS) some 2 billion pounds annually in extra bed days, the National Audit Office said. The spending watchdog said that many incidents -- that range from patient falls to patients being given the wrong medication -- still went unreported and that the number of people injured or killed could be much higher. "Other estimates of deaths range from 840 to 34,000 but, in reality, the NHS simply does not know," the report said.

Just a sidebar to all those that really think a socialized health care system is the way to go. Everyone can afford it, but the quality drops through the floor.

To me, it’s kind of like the difference between Coke and “COLA”. Everyone can afford the “COLA”, but it isn’t as good as Coke. Except this is about people’s lives, not their soda.