Are we really going to sit by while they destroy the NHS?
- Thread starter Bernie Gunther
- Start date
Libertad
Sparking up a rollie in the Reichstag
Yep, I'm becoming increasingly stabby.
chainsawjob
Kipping in the dunes
Petition to Leader of the House to stop the practice of filibustering, following what happened with the NHS bill Stop Filibustering in The House Of Commons | Campaigns by You
ItWillNeverWork
Messy Crimbobs, fellow humans.
If the number of signatures on a 38degrees petition reaches 100,000, do parliament have to debate the issue? If not, why the fuck did the person setting this up not use the official government petition website? They've basically wasted all those peoples' signatures.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
The petition will have the same effect as marching, very little. Even if there is a change of government next time round, nothing will change.
Welcome to the new reality, whether you like it or not.
The NHS is unsustainable in its present form, and should have been reformed decades ago. The German model works well, and should certainly be considered. The NHS is capable of absorbing the entire GDP, If you let it.
Rather than bleating on here, the young amongst us should be looking at the best health insurance they can afford. For those amongst us who are old, we are fucked, pretty much. With my medical history, age and income, health insurance is not an option for me, I'm stuck with the more than slightly inadequate NHS.
The NHS in its present form is finished. Too many obese people and too many old people with dementia and chronic illness hasn't helped, and that situation will get worse.
I appreciate that the NHS is cherished, but it needs to change. Personally, I don't care who provides the services, as long as they are good.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
Danny, you speak as if it matters. It doesn't. Even if it is debated in parliament, what will change? Both major parties support what is happening.
Better perhaps for unions to start and negotiate health insurance plans for their members.
ItWillNeverWork
Messy Crimbobs, fellow humans.
Haven't got time or energy for this shit. Just get to fuck Sasaferrato.
magneze
🎧
Garbage.
chainsawjob
Kipping in the dunes
Good question, and I have to admit I wasn't totally clear on this myself. The short answer is no, but 38Degrees spokespeople give a reasonable case for them still being valuable in this article MPs' new petitions group won't accept campaigns from hugely popular websites
I'm as sceptical about the power of petitions as the next person, there are so many of them now, clicktivism and all that, but there have been some successes, so I still sign some of them, or at least I go through peaks and troughs of being hopeful about them making a difference. Some are worded pretty poorly I have to say, or don't really have a clear enough objective.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
You are a fantasist. You cannot seperate what you want, from what you will get.
The NHS is so far from its original ethos that it will never go back. Why do you find this so hard to comprehend?
The Urban bubble is a strange place, absolutely certain that collectively, your view is right, with little time for dissent, and liberal amounts of abuse for those who do.
Anyone who feels that the NHS as it stands, is fit for purpose is addled. It isn't, and is going to get worse.
There are a number of reasons why the NHS is in its current state. Serial major re-jigs by succesive governments is a major part, if not the primary cause of today's situation. Every major change has cost a lot of money, and achieved nothing.
There is a relatively simple reason why the NHS is dying, increasing demand which has not been met by the necessary increased budget. You can do more with less, to a point. We are well beyond that point.
People are living longer, with the associated health problems. Obesity and dementia are putting an increased strain on the service, so are hip replacements, knee replacements etc. Beds are blocked by patients who are able to be discharged, but not able to return home without help. The help is not there because it hasn't been funded.
New and very expensive cancer treatments come along. A very thorny issue. Is it worth spending £30k to give someone a few extra months of life? Should a breast cancer drug be used that is twice the cost of existing treatments, but gives only a 5% extra chance of remission compared to existing treatments?
Unpalatable as it may be, the NHS as we knew it is gone. Being unwilling to accept that will not change anything.
I am a pragmatist, when I see that something is no longer viable, or shortly won't be, then I look at how I can move forward from there. In the case of the NHS, the way forward is a complete change, we can either spend the necessary funds and restore it to its original condition, or, we can move to an entirely different system. The German model works well. It costs you more than the NHS does (personally), but the service level is amazing. I had a friend in Rinteln who required a hip replacement. It wasn't a situation of going on the waiting list, it was 'When is it convenient for you?'. He saw his GP on the Monday, had the operation the following Wednesday. Post operatively, he went to a rehab centre for three weeks, to get everything moving again. We went to visist him at the rehab centre, it had a beer shop in the foyer.
You can weep and moan and gnash your teeth, you can sign petitions, you can even march. You will achieve nothing. The NHS is such a money pit that both major parties are desperate to try and bring spending under control. They will do anything, pretty much, to achieve this. If this means 'privitisation' of parts or all of the NHS, that is what will happen, whether you like it or not.
Personally, I would rather see the NHS go back to where it was when I was a student nurse in 1970. It was a clinician led service, not a beancounter led service. There is certainly money to be saved in the current NHS by doing away with the vast majority of the bean counters. I am completely unfussed about who provides medical care, provided it is of a high standard, and the T&Cs of the staff are not eroded. Why does it matter so much that physio services, say, are provided by 'Virgin Health' rather than the NHS? We can continue with the current failing model, or we can be pragmatic and look at how the health budget can be best spent.
I genuinely feel for the coming generations, their health care is going to cost them much more than ours cost us.
My view of the future is an honest one, I'm not trying to wind anyone up. I have a vested interest in the NHS continuing, I cannot afford private health insurance, I even find it difficult to get travel insurance at all, never mind cheaply. I do recognise however, that despite my wish for the NHS to continue in its classic form, things have changed so much already that there is no going back, much as you would like it to.
magneze
🎧
TL;DR, but comprehensive reply to a one word post.
magneze
🎧
Fuck it, I'll bite. What makes you think a private health service will be less expensive?
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
I don't. For you as an individual, if we used the German model, it would be more expensive.
What it does do (German model) is make health care contractual. If you need treatment, you get treatment.
I've said a number of times that I would be happy to pay 1% extra (or 2%) on my income tax, with the money hypothecated to health care.
Sorry if I keep harping back to money, but it is at the root of the whole thing. What a 'privatised' system does do is give the patient much more of a say. In Germany, there are a number of companies that provide the funding (sick banks in the vernacular, you pay in to them, they pay for the treatment), so there is competition, which keeps costs down.
If we want health care, we have to pay for it. Either we increase the funding of the NHS (and stop fucking it about every five years), or, we set up a 'privatised' system.
When you look at the last six months figures for A&E waits, it is depressing, and we didn't have a really hard Winter. It is cloud cuckoo land to expect the NHS to go on as it is, with the funding allocated. I must admit, when the Coalition announced the 'efficiency savings' that were proposed, I rather naively thought that it should be manageable. It perhaps would have been, had there not been further slices taken off here and there.
IDS resigning, and the concurrent infighting within the government makes it likely that the absolutely unwarranted and downright nasty cuts to PIP will not go ahead. That at least is a small ray of hope.
Going out, back later.
magneze
🎧
I'll have to take your first answer there.
8ball
Decolonise colons!
So it's a choice between EU average funding to get back on track, and not fucking with it, or spending twice as much for a service delivering shit outcomes, as with the US system?
I can see why you're behind the latter, on balance.
purenarcotic
Conveniently Pocket Sized
What stops us from increasing the funding? If the richest were made to pay their tax properly we would see lots more available cash for the NHS. What would those unemployed or low incomes do if they cannot afford insurance?
8ball
Decolonise colons!
It's not about infinite increases to funding as Sass would have us believe while he parrots dogma from Tory Central.
Any system can be improved, and too much reverence towards the NHS can lead to failures in looking at points where it can be weak, but while the wreckers are in town it's good to keep in mind that in terms of lives per pound saved, the NHS is a world leader (Ireland pips the UK at the post on that measure).
Something for Sass to ponder on:
Comparing the USA, UK and 17 Western countries' efficiency and effectiveness in reducing mortality
FridgeMagnet
Administrator
One problem is of course that decades of deliberate destruction of the infrastructure, through "reforms" and just simple chronic underfunding, are really biting to the extent that it is increasingly hard (and expensive) to fix them now. Prevention always being better than cure, and other ironic medical metaphors.
8ball
Decolonise colons!
And yet it still performs right at the top of the league. You need to invest in infrastructure continually, and the value of past expenditure necessarily degrades over time. Which is a bummer in once sense but at least it means you don't need to spend everything you missed spending on in the past to get back on track.
Plus, the other solutions, including privatisation, are more expensive.
The real reason for the push to destroy it is the offence Tories take at the poor having access to quality healthcare. They'll happily double or triple expenditure if they can stop that from happening.
FridgeMagnet
Administrator
Oh sure, it would still be a better idea to fix it than not—in fact even if the NHS completely disintegrated it would still be a better idea to rebuild it from scratch than not—but every year gives the apologists more ammunition to say "well it would cost far too much to fix things now let's go for <insert privatised model X>".
I think we have also gone past the stage of "NHS still operating fully despite cuts". Outside of my personal observations, people I know working in hospitals have described primary care as being almost completely broken now for instance, and the lack of new doctors getting critical.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
Indeed.
The unemployed and those on low incomes are looked after, the amount paid is dependant on earnings.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
And as we all realise, you cannot keep doing that and expect the institution to survive.
I would not be at all surprised if this degradation of the NHS is deliberate. Knock it on to its knees, then cite that as the reason why 'privatisation' is the only solution.
Osborne is scum, and worse still, scum with an eye on the top job.
I have no wish to see the NHS die, but it is a lamentable state at the moment, and I don't see the necessary funding coming.
The NHS cannot survive on its present course, and although Labour are making disapproving noises about the current funding, there is no hard commitment to increase it.
teqniq
DisMembered
No shit Sherlock.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
Interesting read, however, it is historical. That time has passed.
It is the future that concerns me, the data in that article is ten years old, I wonder what the figures would like if the survey was done today?
The US health care system is not something to emulate, the German system probably is.
I have seen this slow car crash coming for twenty years, twenty years ago I was selling medical equipment to the NHS, or rather I wasn't, because even then money was tight.
It is difficult to see what we can do. Changing government is no guarantee of proper funding.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
Quite. We need a health care system, and I'm in absolute agreement that fixing the NHS is the best option. I'm also in absolute agreement regarding the critical state of the NHS at present. I waited for six hellish months for 'urgent' nerve conduction tests, to see whether I had MND or not. Thank God, it was not, however, I have severe (probably inoperable) narrowing of the spinal canal in the neck and lower back, which is what was causing (and still is) the symptoms. It is probably inoperable because of previous surgery at both sites, the scar tissue makes a CSF leak post operatively more likely, and that can be fatal. What the future holds, who knows, but it isn't rosy.
ItWillNeverWork
Messy Crimbobs, fellow humans.
The means-testing model has never worked. We've had almost 200 years of trying it in various forms from the advent of the poor laws until now. The reason is that if you set up a distinction between those 'on welfare' and those not, a self-destruction mechanism is right away built into the system that sees the well-off use their political power to deprive others of access to those services. The only system that is sustainable politically as well as economically is a universal one based on medical need and funded via progressive taxation.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
The German system functions well, but it's uneconomical compared to the NHS, and lag times for "popular" specialisms are long compared to the NHS.
Maybe hospital staff avoid giving you good service, because you're such a crabbit old scrote?
In the last 6 months I've had 6 procedures on my GI tract and bowel, as well as general outpatient stuff like x-rays, bloods and physio. The only complaint I can level at my treatment, is that appointment times sometimes slipped. Apart from that, the service was excellent.
Dementia care has always been shit. it's a question of resource allocation. People with dementia don't tend to vote, so...
As for obesity, we both know it's solvable through education and legislation, but the ruling classes don't give a fuck for povs.
And there's the rub! No cunt who supports marketisation ever stops to think that invariably private-sector provision is worse, both because of the profit motive - and how profits are realised - and because the people at the top of the provider pyramid have no vocation beyond bean-counting.
Sasaferrato
Super Refuser!
I made no complaint whatsoever about the quality of NHS treatment.
What I did do, and still do, is query whether the NHS as we know it can survive. My considered opinion is that it cannot.
It would suit the government (of any stripe) well, to divorce health care from the state. It would then be up to the customer to seek the best care they can afford, with a fairly basic system funded from the benefits system.
Both main parties swear undying loyalty to the NHS, but are not prepared to fund it properly. As I've said before; and I have no more love of income tax than anyone else; I would pay an extra 1 or 2% on my income tax, with the money hypothecated for health care.
Being pragmatic, were I twenty again, I would be looking for the best private health care I could afford, because the younger you join most schemes, the better the lifetime premiums.
I don't want the NHS to die, but it is dying by degrees, and unless it is properly funded, it will not continue in its present form. I've watched the NHS for half a century, and it is slowly sinking.
Indeed in some areas it has effectively sunk. I listened to father describe how the London based family were travelling to the Midlands, to visit their child, because there was not a single junior psychiatric bed any closer.
Interesting, in the light of the junior doctors strike, that you mention vocation. That horse has bolted I fear.
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