NHS - not fit for purpose?

steve0 said:
Not a football thread. No apologies.
It’s tragic for me that after 40 years in the NHS I will soon leave it with waiting lists as bad as when I joined. The rumblings about the NHS not being fit for purpose are beginning. Watch out for backbenchers and media trumpeting the arrival of the private sector on its shiny new white charger to save it. None of the facts below will be seen or heard in newspapers or on tv - achieved in spite of COVID and in spite of this government:

1. Last year 242,307 Covid patients were treated in hospital.
2. In January this year 101,956 were treated.
3. In addition more than 6m elective treatments were completed in 2020, despite Covid.
4. More than two cancer procedures were carried out for every one patient treated for Covid.
5. There were >18.7 million A&E attendances.
6. 25,199 cancer patients started treatment in December, 555 more than in the same month the previous year.
7. 200,940 people were referred for cancer checks, 13,129 more than December 2019.
8. Waiting times for elective surgery fell by more than 40% between July and the end of the year.
9. Hospitals are treating over a thousand more patients with COVID than they did at the peak of the first wave.
10. The NHS is currently treating more people with COVID in critical care than hospitals did for all conditions this time last year in addition to the other critical care activity.

And yet despite the criticisms …here we are…still standing…still there for you largely free at the point of care. Not perfect but available to everyone and better than what they have planned for us

There will come a time soon when we turn around (when we need it) and say ‘where the hell did that go?’

Rant over. Back to the football. UTB
Click to expand...
You need to put that on the side of a bus mate!👍
 
"That’s the standard technique of privatization: defund, make sure things don’t work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital"

Noam Chomsky

This is essentially what this Tory government and those that have gone before have done systematically. Not only to the NHS but many other industries too.
 
Adi_Dem said:
"That’s the standard technique of privatization: defund, make sure things don’t work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital"

Noam Chomsky

This is essentially what this Tory government and those that have gone before have done systematically. Not only to the NHS but many other industries too.
Click to expand...
Chomsky nails it. The people get angry about what they are told to get angry about rather than what they SHOULD get angry about. To succeed though it needs a platform of communication/propaganda. It cannot be done without a complicit media
 
steve0 said:
Chomsky nails it. The people get angry about what they are told to get angry about rather than what they SHOULD get angry about. To succeed though it needs a platform of communication/propaganda. It cannot be done without a complicit media
Click to expand...

And a docile voting populous.
 
steve0 said:
Chomsky nails it. The people get angry about what they are told to get angry about rather than what they SHOULD get angry about. To succeed though it needs a platform of communication/propaganda. It cannot be done without a complicit media
Click to expand...

And a malleable electorate.
 
If the NHS wasn't here I would be dead.
Instead I work for a wage that isn't huge but I don't need to claim any benefits.
I pay my taxes and national insurance just like you do.
But I have to hold my hands up and say a lot of that money has been payed back to me in doctors, nurses, hospitals etc.
I cannot get life insurance because of my health and I expect private healthcare will be the same. Perhaps not initially, when it gets sold to us, but eventually.
So all I can say is thank you to all you taxpayers who have contributed to the NHS and given me a fantastic life.
Where we go from here is for everyone to decide.
 
Smoginexile said:
If the NHS wasn't here I would be dead.
Instead I work for a wage that isn't huge but I don't need to claim any benefits.
I pay my taxes and national insurance just like you do.
But I have to hold my hands up and say a lot of that money has been payed back to me in doctors, nurses, hospitals etc.
I cannot get life insurance because of my health and I expect private healthcare will be the same. Perhaps not initially, when it gets sold to us, but eventually.
So all I can say is thank you to all you taxpayers who have contributed to the NHS and given me a fantastic life.
Where we go from here is for everyone to decide.
Click to expand...
Likewise smoginexile. I have also benefited massively and (unfortunately) continue to have to rely on the NHS to keep me alive and (relatively) well. But there is a subculture(?) of hate and disregard for others that would I think see those who are vulnerable are a burden best left to their own devices. Worse than anything I saw under Thatcher enabled and amplified by the very people in government whose role is to serve our needs
 
Anyone who sees how this country has done relative to most others during the pandemic for vaccinations and Covid treatment and thinks the NHS isn't fit for purpose is either thick as mince or a profiteering Tory crony type.
 
Adi_Dem said:
Case in point.
Click to expand...
Of course it would. Needs investment and thoughtful joined up planning. Incredible complex but not impossible for a competent government that has the desire to fix it for the people. Not a hope in hell with this shower then
 
I’ve had to use the NHS during this pandemic for non COVID related reasons and not one appointment we’ve had has been cancelled or delayed.
I know that is mainly due to paediatrics being largely unaffected by COVID backlogs, but financially I probably would have been ruined without the NHS.
I look at people in the US who have to pay for the same things and they either struggle with insurance and paying the excess, or taking on mountains of debt.
The NHS has been fantastic for us.
 
If something highlights the government's attack on the NHS it can be summed up by this.

The NHS track and trace.
The government vaccine roll out.

They are in fact completely the other way around, however with the first it makes the NHS look expensive and inefficient (despite being nothing to do with the NHS. I don't see any doctors or nurses involved in track and trace). And the vaccine roll is hailed as a governmentbeing success despite being carried out by doctors and nurses in hospitals and GP surgeries.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top