Health News Blog

Mental health service is a national emergency
A post Covid surge has created a national emergency in mental health. Funding in real terms has been cut since 2010. The service is so stretched that patients in dire need end up in acute hospital beds.

NHS charging would raise only a small sum
Tories have repeatedly called for charging for NHS services. But an Institute For Government report has concluded that charges would be difficult to administer, would raise only small sums for the NHS and would stop some patients seeking medical help.

Why are GPs so stressed?
It's due to the number of contacts in the day - high in England. Also, UK GPs do more to a greater degree of complexity than in any other country. Most GPs across the world don’t, for example, do paediatrics or maternity.

How much does your ICS give private companies?
Keep Our NHS Public has produced databases for campaigners to explore NHS private sector contracts awarded through the ICBs, Trusts and Foundation Trusts. Find out how much your Integrated Care Board pays out your money to private companies.

Private contract terminated after service failures
An Integrated Care Board has dismissed a private healthcare company and handed the contract back to the publicly-run NHS following concerns about performance and staffing problems.

Immigrant cancer patient given a £76K bill
Omisha was 10 months old when she was diagnosed with a rare form of liver cancer. She needed a liver transplant. The NHS saved her life. Sign her petition against the £76000 bill her parents have been asked for by Barking, Redbridge and Havering Hospital Trust.

Tory donor handed £135 million in NHS contracts
Frank Hester owns a healthcare tech company that supplies computer systems to the NHS. He gave the Tories £5 million this year. His company received £137 million NHS contracts since April 2020. He is the only sharehoilder.

Dilapidated hospitals regularly shut
NHS England’s deputy chief executive told the House of Commons public accounts committee that some hospitals are so dilapidated that they regularly have to shut wards and operating theatres to safeguard patients’ safety; such are the problems caused by hospitals being left structurally unsound.

Rational approach to NHS funding
"What works? Comparison with other healthcare systems shows that the (pre-underfunded) fundamental NHS business model is the gold standard, the pre-eminent healthcare system in the world. What went wrong? The evidence shows that the principal reason for the current fall-off in service levels is chronic and severe underfunding." A report by a professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

"Improve mental health funding or children die"
A coroner says unless mental health services are funded better more children will die. Mental health has sufferd cuts in funding since 2010.

NHS funding the private sector is senseless
"...taking NHS staff away, diverting NHS funding, cherry picking non-complex care and using the NHS to send back complications from private treatment. It is NHS capacity that must urgently be rebuilt."

Tax the rich for good public services
Labour's ultra low risk approach to policies if in power will not supply the services the public want. Here the Guardian's economics editor discusses fiscal options for Labour. Tax expert Richard Murphy identifies ways for Labour to raise tax revenue.

More funding is the only answer
"In 1997, there was a change of government. The voters demonstrated decisively that they wanted their politicians to put the NHS back at the top of their priorities, and taxpayers’ money flooded in. Morale among doctors, nurses and allied professionals began quickly to rise, and patient satisfaction, too."

GP vacancy rates reach record levels
Nearly one in five GP positions in the UK are unfilled according to a survey, the highest since the data has been collected. "The recruitment crisis is a culmination of a few things: secondary care passing back work and refusing referrals; lack of investment in the GP contract, making partnership unappealing to newly qualified GPs; and a torrid working environment that encourages earlier GP retirement."

Government is not fully funding the nurses pay award
Organisations contracted by the NHS that use the Agenda for Change pay scale - charities, primary care services, social enterprises, independent healthcare providers, nursing and care homes – will have to cover costs from tight budgets already stretched to the limit. Also there's a funding gap for NHS staff employed by trusts working to deliver key public health contracts commissioned by local authorities.

Hospital waiting list deaths double in 5 years
The number of NHS patients that die while waiting for treatment has doubled in 5 years.