I think this tweet and the linked report in The Times from yesterday says all that we need to know about this government's attitude towards the NHS:
Nothing this government says it will do happens.
Everything gets worse.
And the problem is, there is little prospect of change.
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How is it possible for the amount of money being spent to go up, and what you get go down? Who or what is doing the spending and what are they spending it on. I doubt corruption so there has to be a major structural issue.
Is the spend going up in real terms?
I have recently had some dealings with the NHS and unsurprisingly its most notable feature is the very poor communication between its constituent parts and between the NHS and patients.
The result is chaos, delay and staff working frantically to less and less effect.
It would be reassuring to know that before the next lot of “reforms”, that somebody had done some realistic research to identify beyond argument the problems, but unfortunately that is unlikely to happen.
No one has, in this communicatiin era, found a way for the NHS to communi9cate properly
Apparently, there are still some fax machines in use
And consultants and radiologists often still dictate their findings and recommendations into old-fashioned tape machines, for the typing pool to type onto paper reports, which can take weeks to process. Whereas in most working environments all staff, from the CEO on down, type their information directly into a computer, and email it within seconds.
What a waste of consultant time that would be
One of the roots of our ‘productivity paradox’ in my opinion.
From the 80s onwards, everyone was expected to type up their own documents, without having been taught how to type, regardless of whether that was a good use of their time. Thus a whole load of ‘work about work’ was created that adds absolutely no value.
Why anyone types when most of the time their computer / phone will be 98% or more accurate when it comes to dictation is hard to understand. And yes, it does sometimes pick the wrong word, as it is apparent here on occasion. This comment was dictated.
I am watching the covid inquiry. You wouldn’t believe how many variations of the word covid there are on the subtitles. Viewers are actually told to read the transcripts if they want to know what was really said.
Not all of us have up-to-date phones or laptops that can use speech translations. Not all speech translators can transcribe Geordie or Yorkshire dialect so others can read it, either.
I don’t have actual statistics to back this up but my impression is that more and more of the NHS is provided by for profit organisations. Not only do they cream off a % for their profits but they are also external contracts that a) create an interface for communication which adds time and layers and b) requires a whole system of contract monitoring and tendering that takes time, staff and £ – and where a contract does not go to the private bidder on occasions they then sue the NHS as not having a fair process. Just to develop a tender document takes up not only admin staff time but also clinical staff time so even if the service stays within the NHS a lot of money and staff time will have been spent on it and not on patient care.
https://weownit.org.uk/public-ownership/nhs
Some statistics here for you.
NHS spending does not seem to have kept pace with rdinary inflation for a number of years. But ordinary inflation does not affect the NHS. Medical inflation is different and much higher.
It works like this. If the NHS were to keep doing what it has always done it needs spending increases that match ordinary inflation.
But medical knowledge does not stand still. Techniques, drugs and equipment are being developed all the time, so that a disease which was once a death sentence on diagnosis (diabetes, for instance) can be well controlled and managed by using appropriate medication and treatment. It was a great deal less fianacially costly when people just died of diabetes, but no-one would suggest that would be the appropriate outcome. Diabetes treatment was revolutionised around 100 years ago. Nearly all diseases are now better treated than they were. But the new treatments cost more than the old. So medical inflation is a lot more than ordinary inflation.
Which is why Labour spending on the NHS was higher than ordinary inflation. The tories don’t seem to understand this.
How could beds rise without staff to treat the occupants?
So, not only did he not ‘deliver’ he knew he had very little chance of delivering. In my book, a clear and intentional lie.
It’s obvious to me that if you take away funding to a service you just have to put it back (adjusted for inflation of course).
This does not seem obvious to Sir Keep Stymied and his Laboured party who now along with austerity are bedraggled by inflation narratives from the Tories. By keeping to these narratives, the Tories have won the next election anyway.
To avoid looking like Truss, all Stymied surely has to do is implement elements of the taxing wealth report to satiate those who don’t know where money comes from (there’s too many like that to argue with).
But no, we have this version of Never, Never Land instead where we just go around in ever decreasing circles of being able to do ‘owt about anything whist the rich wait in open arms to ‘help us out’ – plus interest and ‘added value’ of course.
Even if the NHS was privatised this government still wouldn’t fund it adequately for the retired, the unemployed, the sick and disabled, and those on low incomes. The country is completely corrupt and misgoverned and if you think Labour is going to do much to change this you are ill-informed and naive!
It struck me this morning that the British healthcare system is becoming more like the American one, not just because of the seemingly inexorable slide of privatisation, but also due to the insecurity around healthcare generated by no longer having a health service everyone feels they can really rely on.
The endless barrage of stories like this one – that highlight the chronic and deliberate under-resourcing of the NHS – must make people wonder/worry about the medical help available. In this country we have for a long time taken it for granted that there is a healthcare safety net that is there for us if we need it. And rightly so – it is simply a mark of a decent society that we shouldn’t have to suffer from existential angst over our prospects if we are unlucky enough to need medical help.
The effects of ongoing long-term austerity such as this are surely causing massive psychological stress in the population. That’s undermining well-being and making people more physically and mentally ill.
“It struck me this morning that the British healthcare system is becoming more like the American one”
Well yes and no. Having lived in the United States government at various levels still adequately funds if you are retired, unemployed, sick and disabled, and those on low incomes. Where the problem comes is if your employer doesn’t have an adequate healthcare scheme. Here the corruption is so deep and entrenched it’s doubtful if the NHS will get adequately funded under either the Conservative or Labour parties. The other problem is healthcare costs twice as much as the UK because of profit taking and federal government tending to rubber stamp cost increases.
https://weownit.org.uk/blog/13-years-under-knife-our-protest-labour-conference-keir-starmer-end-nhs-privatisation
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06FjXEB5E8c
The NHS has been Americanised since Simon Stevens took over when he came back from America, having been CEO of United Health insurance company. He started his NHS career as a porter in my local hospital, Shotley Bridge. They had to close the wards down there because of problems with the water system, and there is supposed to be a new one opening up. Locals objected to the siting of the new hospital next to a proposed newly built incinerator overlooking the Durham Dales. So far we are winning on the incinerator, but there is no site for the hospital as yet, despite our redwall MP boasting about it all the time.
When Starmer and Streeting talk about reforming the NHS they hope we have forgotten that it has just been reformed into ICSs or ICBs, all of which have overspent and are the British equivalent of the US system of ICSs.
Lots more on weownit’s site, and lots more petitions to sign there.
My mother trained as a nurse at Shotley Bridge. One of I think the second cohort of NHS nurses. How sad.
Kirsten, Shotley Bridge hospital is still there. There are no wards, just an outpatients. I had a covid vaccination there last year. However, whether it will last until the new one is open there is no knowing. The new one was supposed to open in 2025, but has been postponed now. The latest is that they are committed to opening it but there is no timeline any more.
Simon Stevens swore it would never close! He’s in the lords now.
“Hundreds of hospital beds bought for Nightingale wards built during the pandemic are being sold for as little as £6 each [..] It bought them for £2,500 each but they cannot be used in established health service wards as they do not meet current standards.” — The Mirror, 31 Aug 2023
Source: https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/hospital-scandal-exposed-hundreds-covid-30827249
Had an email from Barnardo’s. More than 1 in 20 children have to sleep on the floor as their parents can’t afford beds for them. Surely a much better use of these beds than selling them for £6. One of the Nightingale hospitals is up in Washington, so it wouldn’t cost much to get them to the area which has the biggest foodbank in the country.
Just to remind you about the relative health cost. The UK spends about 10% and the USA 18% of GDP.
The poor in the USA (any one without a good job) has no health care at all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fBxkvx6EEA
A US doctor working in a London A&E telling us all about the US system on here.
On a broader front the following article in the Guardian shows the need for specific public and private investment but all we get from the Conservatives, Labour and most of the mainstream media is rhetoric about how we can’t afford it. We now live in Mindless Rhetoric Land!
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/oct/18/uk-infrastructure-needs-much-more-investment-say-government-advisers
Jonathan Pie succinctly sums up the gradual – and by now perilously near complete – privatisation of the NHS here (BBC so no swearing):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IO2Z-iIBYwY
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