Health News Blog

Darzi shows need for more funding
The Darzi report identifies the appalling state of the NHS, but doesn't state the obvious solution - more funding.  He accuses "consecutive Conservative administrations from 2010 to July 2024 of inflicting “unforgivable” damage on the NHS".

We can afford the NHS
"When it [the government] needed money to prevent a collapse in the banking system – via the Bank of England’s Quantitative Easing programme – simply created around £445 billion of new money. Money that it had been saying it did not have. And again, during the COVID lockdown, the Government created around £450 billion more to prevent a collapse in household finances when people would otherwise have had no income."

Child spent 44 days in A&E
This is the state of our health and social care. This article has a pay wall. In effect the child was waiting for a care placement, illustrating the national emergency that is the state of the NHS and social care system.

Primary care in crisis too
Primary care is described by some as at breaking point, as is the rest of the NHS and social care, resulting in higher levels of mortality, illness, pain, and anxiety. However, this crisis was not inevitable, nor the consequence of the pandemic, but the result of successive political decisions, a government made crisis.

Labour and private sector
Excellent article on the government's intention of greater use of private healthcare. A recent systematic review concluded that “outsourcing of services to the private sector does not seem to deliver both better care and cheaper care.”

Lansley Act 'seriously weakened' the NHS
Britain was hit far harder by the Covid-19 pandemic than other developed countries because the NHS had been “seriously weakened” by disastrous government policies.

NHS campaigner's view of way forward
"Simplistic view that technology, apps and AI are the solution wasted billions and ended in failure". The NHS, when funded to succeed, has been and would be again, one of the very best, safest and most cost-effective health services in the world.

Untrained strike breakers
A trust has been accused of putting patients at risk by bringing in ‘untrained strike-breakers’ from hundreds of miles away and paying for their hotel accommodation to ‘disrupt’ a week-long walkout by facilities management staff. There is no doubt that when out-sourced workers will get poorer terms and conditions of work, for example they will lose their NHS pension rights.

The MAPS dilemma
Here's a well-written assessment of the issue.  There's a new role into the health service, the medical associate professional (MAP). MAPs are usually degree holders who have undergone a two-year condensed and abridged programme of clinical studies. But is it safe? Does it actually reduce costs? Is the quality of care maintained? How much supervision is required and how can it be funded?

Labour must deal with social care crisis
Labour cannot avoid it, there's a crisis in UK care homes. Private equity has seen the profits to be made out of care homes while the wages of 1.6 million care workers are at rock bottom; half of them are below the legal minimum wage. A typical urban local authority has at least 40% less money to spend on social care than it had in 2010.

Another A&E death
Inga Rublite, 39, died after being found unconscious on the floor under a coat eight hours after arriving at A&E at Queens Medical Centre in Nottingham. The Labour government must resolve the under-funding of our health service. The signs are too stark to ignore.

How to rescue the NHS
It seems the new government is determined to echo the Tories’ grim commitment to austerity, while allowing the super-rich and corporations to get even richer. Regarding the NHS, no amount of 'reform' (code for privatisation) will avoid the need for substantial investment for Starmer’s Labour to make real progress.

Findings of Health Foundation report
1) The public’s views of the standard of NHS care and expectations for the future are already low; 2) waiting times of routine services to get worse in coming year: 3) Top priorities for the NHS are reducing the number of staff leaving the NHS by improving working conditions and making it easier to get appointments at GP practices.

Privatisation of mental healthcare
More than £1.4 billion has been spent on private mental health beds between 2019 and 2024 by the NHS in England. In that time, spending had risen by 68%.

Trust 'Too compassionate' to run services
...so East Suffolk and North Essex is out-sourcing its cleaning, catering and portering services. It plans to replace kindly and reasonable management with tough privatised exploitation. So staff are striking over the plan to privatise their jobs; please sign a petition of support.