Michael Moore.

Running time: 124 mins . . . .

MICHAEL Moore has become such a success that even resentful liberals jealous of his celebrity status and ability to reach a mass audience have taken to knocking him. Moore's weapon, as with the satirists of Hitler in 1930s Germany, is ridicule. To make it effective he's not above resorting to oversimplification and cheap stunts, for which documentary purists damn him.

Unlike Bowling For Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11, his attack on the seriously sick US healthcare system doesn't rely on his own charismatic presence. He remains mostly off-screen, providing a sarcastic voiceover as he zooms in on a series of horror stories typifying a failed system that was brought about by a secret deal between Richard Nixon and a health industry that subsequently spent $100m defeating president Bill Clinton's universal healthcare package.

The case he makes is not even controversial. Most Americans know it to be true from their own experience. The importance of Sicko is that it puts it up the agenda by confronting millions of Americans with the reality behind the damning statistics.

It's not only 47 million uninsured Americans who are victimised.

Even those who think they have paid-up health insurance find themselves denied crucial treatments.

Profit shouldn't have anything to do with making decisions on healthcare but health companies in the US are legally required to maximise profits for their shareholders. If they don't they are in breach of the law.

Promotions within the industry are determined by success in denying claims. Successful medical claims are labelled as "medical loss". A woman in a coma rushed to hospital after a car accident had to pay her bills because she failed to get approval in advance from her insurance company. Private hospitals in Los Angeles keep costs down by covertly dumping destitute patients on the street outside homeless shelters.

Moore discovered rescue workers suffering lung problems from the effects of working at Ground Zero were being denied care by the government. He hired a boat and took them to Guantanamo Bay where even abducted and tortured prisoners suspected of being terrorists receive full medical care. When the boat was turned away, Moore put in at Havana where the patients got state-of-the-art diagnostic services and treatment. One patient was charged five cents for a drug that costs $120 in the US.

Moore films Americans driving over the border to Canada for immediate and free treatment in emergency wards and where a man who lost two fingertips in an ice hockey accident has them put back on free of charge. In the US one fingertip would have cost $60,000 to repair, the other $12,000.

In France he discovers free medical care . . . so-called "socialised medicane anethama" to American conservatives . . . is followed up by free homecare, with health workers who come to the homes of patients to cook meals, tidy up and even take care of the laundry. Which sets up Sicko's punch line . . . a shot of Moore walking towards the White House with his laundry.

So what has this to offer an Irish audience. Alas, too much.

With the Irish governement intent on building up the increased involvement of private hospitals run for profit on the American model, Sicko could soon be an Irish disease too.