Most Australians have come to see free healthcare as our birthright, so I was shocked to hear a friend recently shelled out more than $300 for a specialist emergency clinic after accidentally stabbing her palm with a kitchen knife.

It wasn’t her first choice. She waited an hour in a crammed Sydney emergency department before the triage nurse warned it would be another four hours until she could be seen. In the end, she decided it would be quicker to drive half an hour and pay the premium to get it sorted.

That’s not an option for most Australians, but shows demand exists for a service our hospitals are no longer equipped to provide. Perhaps they never were.

Angus Thomson in the waiting room of an urgent care clinic.

Let’s compare her ordeal with what happened to me the following weekend, when I tumbled off the front of my surfboard and its fin ripped open a three-centimetre gash across my right foot.

I hardly needed an ambulance, but there was enough blood to pique the interest of........

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