Precis:
Allyson Pollock & Peter Roderick Warning
The Health and Care Bill which was introduced in the House of Commons on 6 July 2021 is a major reorganisation of the NHS in England which will complete the dismantling of it as a universal, comprehensive, publicly funded and provided service free at the point of delivery.
It is an astonishing attempt to allow the Secretary of State, an enlarged NHS England as ‘rule-maker and regulator’, and new public-private ‘Integrated Care Boards’ (ICBs), to reduce services, limit expenditure, further degrade local accountability and entrench the market.
Key points – summary
If Parliament enacts this Bill:
1.there will no longer be a statutory duty on any body to arrange provision
of secondary (i.e., hospital) medical services – only a power for ICBs
to do so;
Trolleys lined up outside A&E, no A&E reception beds, too few A&E
doctors...
12 hour admission waits...
GP appointments difficult... GPs leaving faster than starting, 11 years to train...
Cancer delays...New Labour-7% extra funding reduced waits to near zero...
Exhausted staff, rising vacancies-half of nurses over 50..., 1in5 leaves during
training..., 1in3 in their first year...
Social care even more bereft... (Polly Toynbee) Government still rejects staff
planning...
How much do we want to spend on Health? The UK is undertaxed: 33% of gdp-the EU 39%...
Governments of all colours really want rid of the NHS and Social care: it has increasing uncontrollable outlay, and government, especially the PM and Health secretary get the blame.
On the other hand, the NHS and Social care is the UK’s greatest achievement. Nobody goes bankrupt, as in the US, for want of health conditions
The US model is the most expensive, most divisive, most
inequitable, worst outcomes.
The profiteer companies cherry pick only the profitable treatments, over charge,
defraud, and let Medicare pick up the rest.
40% of all bankruptcies are from inability to pay medical and care bills.
The NHS system has been intentionally fragmented and dismantled: even medics, nurses, midwives do not understand its complex myriad nano particles, of bodies, committees and boards...
We need urgently to simplify the structures
The S of S for Health should have
the duty to provide comprehensive care
The NHS in England has c100,000 vacancies: 40,000 nurses,
10,000 doctors short-so staff workwork extra hours (Denis Campbell-Telegraph)
The UK has only 3.93 hospital doctors per 100,000 peopple-the lowest in Europe
UK has only 2.42 beds per 100,000 people-second lowest after Sweden, and is
low down the scale for nurses, CT, MRI scanners...
The NHS should be the default provider-not private profiteers
We have no need of dozens of £700k managers-except to administer US style
accountable care organisations, and private variable cover health insurance.
Do not swallow the government’s spin and lies about improving integration: this is impossible with social care being privatised, GP practices being privatised by Centene et al…
Integrated care was certainly possible after Bevan, now impossible after Lansley's Monster Act, and this 2021 Act of Folly.
Thatcher, Howe, Redwood and Letwin, K Clark started this regressive strategy in the 1980’s
David Cameron, Theresa May and Boris have never tackled the staffing problem, and the 2021 Health and Social Care bill ignores staffing and workforce planning once again!
Where does the private profiteer sector get staff-it steals NHS trained staff from the public NHS!
Decision needed to make the UK-wide NHS and Social care, child protection the world beating, inexpensive, publicly funded service
This government bleat on about record funding (may be highest number, but under inflation year after year…)
Planning a hospital
Requirements
-plenty of land, near a dual carriageway, near town, rail and bus,
-a prudent surplus of surgeons, consultants, anaethetists, nurses, midwives
-Space to expand-do not sell off cottage hospitals, land
-Car parks for free nurses parking
-Plenty of A & E reception beds to unload ambulances-with staff
-More beds-a prudent surplus-and staff
Pandemic reception pods adjacent to A & E, ICU, but separate
Ambulance dedicated in and out, logistical parking bays , more ambulance men, more ambulances-no eight hour waits
This requires NO PFI, proper government investment, NOT in profiteer, privatised units. Cancel HS2-I have no wish to travel to Birmingham, certainly not by train. Better to electrify all non electric lines... stop using diesel.
To stop “bed blocking”
adequate Social care beds, adjacent to hospitals, new build, with well paid
NHS staff, not profiteer private owners
In Cornwall the situation with bed blocking is so dire that government offer £1200 to families to receive their relatives from hospitals Care home beds lie empty because staff are low paid, not employed by the NHS at NHS pay rates and career progression.
Suggestions:
encrypted email for letters to patients, staff etc-would save millions in postage charges
pandemic covid pods near A & E, near ICU for Covid patients-not within a general hospital-needs staff and HEPA air con
Care homes to have oversight by the NHS, with NHS staff level wages and career progression