Davkaus Posted January 8, 2017 Share Posted January 8, 2017 3 hours ago, StefanAVFC said: May on Ridge this morning: (re NHS) "I don't accept the Red Cross' position on this" How can anyone defend these evil words removed anymore? She's a politician that doesn't accept any positions other than the knee-jerk, uninformed conclusion she initially jumped to. See her previously trying to tamper with a drugs report because the conclusion reached by people who actually know what they're doing seemed to contradict her half-baked dogmatic approach. She's a moron, a dangerous moron, who seems proud to overrule people who are actually informed on the topic they're briefing her on. But **** it. There's no crisis, let's have a semi-erect red white and blue NHS. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Davkaus Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 Now, these are clearly self-selecting responses to a left leaning paper, I'm sure anyone that contacted them and said 'it's no worse than any other winter' probably isn't getting published, but the claims below seem to be far from isolated incidents. I swing back and forth on whether it's utter incompetence, or a malicious plan to starve the NHS until the whole bloody lot can be privatised, and to hell with anyone who loses their life while the tories destroy the NHS. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/jan/08/an-absolute-warzone-nhs-doctors-describe-their-week-in-ae?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other Quote 'The worst conditions in memory': NHS doctors describe a week in A&E After PM denies NHS faces a humanitarian crisis, medics tell of ‘horrendous’ working conditions and patients coming to harm The Guardian asked a number of doctors working in A&E departments across the country to explain how their departments have coped over the past seven days, said to have been the worst week ever for NHS emergency departments. These are some of their responses: ‘We are devastated by underemployment’ It’s been like an absolute war zone recently. The government at the moment, not to mention my regulatory bodies, are ignoring the worst hospital conditions in my memory. We have a brilliant team, but are devastated by underemployment and underinvestment. We have two permanent registrars on a rota of seven places. On a recent shift, I walked in to patients waiting four and a half hours to see a doctor. This means every patient has failed the “breach” target by the time they’re seen. A diligent staff nurse asked me to take a look at a patient she was “a bit worried about”. The woman was devastatingly ill with a perforated bowel, and could have easily become fatally unwell. She survived thanks to the observational diligence of my colleague, and later our excellent surgical team. The London ambulance service is similarly overwhelmed. They couldn’t provide me with a transfer ambulance for another emergency case, an 11-year-old with a sight-threatening infection, in less than 70 minutes. The target is eight minutes. It is a miracle the child didn’t lose an eye. ‘Nothing can be done’ Our hospital is crumbling and is unsafe on a daily basis. On Thursday, there were 75 patients in a department that has 18 majors’ beds. Thirty-five of those were medical patients awaiting beds, 20 hadn’t been seen as there was nowhere to see them or no staff to triage them. Analysis Theresa May cannot ignore NHS crisis or brush off critics Figures show health service performance is at an all-time low and the hospitals crisis is out of control Read more We have expressed our concerns verbally, via formal emails to trust, incident reports etc, but nothing can be done as it can’t elsewhere either. Medical professionals are talking about quitting as they believe soon someone will die on our watch … [It is] completely out of control. Maybe it has already happened and we just don’t know. I’m talking about a cohort of 11 doctors. God knows what people feel nationally. It scares me what we are heading for. When a family member got admitted last weekend I panicked, not because it was that serious but I actually felt they may not be safe in hospital. I am angry that it is being ignored and swept under the carpet. I am angry that we are left to pick up the pieces and apologise for a system we’ve put our hearts and souls into, but now have no control over. ‘It’s not acceptable to practise medicine in this way’ This past week in A&E has been horrendous. There are no beds in this busy teaching hospital. There are more than 20 patients queueing in the corridor at any given time. We’re seeing, treating and discharging patients in the queue. It’s undignified to ask a miscarrying pregnant woman about her blood loss in a queue, never mind in one filled with loud drunks. It’s just not acceptable to have to practise medicine in this way, but what choice do we have? Theresa May urged to get a grip on NHS as winter crisis spirals Read more Patients in the queue have a substandard quality of care. Fact. So much for calling 999 in an emergency, then waiting an age for the crew to arrive because they’re all waiting in the corridors of A&E to unload patients. Even once you arrive at the department with said emergency, you’ll be waiting hours for any sort of assessment or treatment. My collusion in this depravity is solely in an attempt to keep my patients as safe as possible, but mistakes are being made and this is not sustainable. ‘We were truly swamped’ I was on call at night for the last week at a small district general hospital. We had to put the hospital on divert. There were 15 ambulances waiting for entry and consultants doing their assessments in the back of them. On surgery, despite phenomenal work from the registrar on call, we were truly swamped. ‘These are just some of my experiences this week in A&E ...’ A four-bedded resuscitation unit expected to make capacity for eight patients; leaving a shift to come back 24 hours later and finding some of the same patients still in resus; being in charge of the emergency department [ED] overnight with rota gaps; and requesting a divert for a few hours to allow us to catch up, only to be told that the policy has changed and capacity issues now had to be dealt with internally. The Observer view on the crisis in the NHS The unprecedented strain our hospitals are under this winter will put lives at risk. The government must get a grip Read more ‘Everybody is terrified’ In the accident and emergency department where I work, there is provision to keep up to 12 people overnight in case the wards are too full. On Tuesday night there were 27 sick patients all requiring hospital treatment who were kept on corridors and in the laundry room, being cared for by three nurses and one doctor. It’s normal at the moment for 20 to be there overnight. We are having to send patients home we would rather admit, with little to no access to social care. Everybody is terrified. Everybody is waiting for something terrible to happen, because no matter how hard you work, there are too many cracks that are widening for patients to slip through. Stafford is where everything went down a few years ago. It seems the same situation is now happening on a nationwide level. I hope desperately that nobody I love or care about needs to be admitted to hospital right now. I just can’t believe how bad it is compared with last year. ‘The entire system is crumbling’ There are not enough staff and 12 ambulances regularly sitting in the corridor. There are designated corridor nurses. In this ED the patients can wait for eight hours. The emergencies do get seen first, as do the strokes, and the triage nurses pull the sickest out the corridor but sometimes they are seen in the corridor. A consultant is designated for the corridor to ensure safety. A consultant has been staying overnight often lately due to the safety concerns, but that is unsustainable and they are burning out. No one is bothered about breaches any more, it’s the 12-hour trolley waits because the CCG [clinical commissioning group] has to know then and trust board get involved. The entire system is crumbling. On New Year’s Eve our hospital asked for a divert when the wait was eight and a half hours with only 14 ambulances left on the roads in Merseyside. This is not uncommon. The divert was denied because the wait was not the longest, and every other department was in the same situation. ‘We have a daily lack of beds’ I’m a registrar in one of the busiest emergency departments in the country. This past week saw our busiest day on record with nearly 200 people waiting in our department at one point. There was a five-hour wait just to be seen, and a 14-hour wait for beds. I have people queuing to get a space in resuscitation and it regularly becomes dangerous. We have a daily lack of beds due to poor flow of patients out of hospital backing up to the emergency department. Patients are coming to harm and there are undoubtedly deaths arising from the current state of emergency medicine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 20 minutes ago, Davkaus said: I swing back and forth on whether it's utter incompetence, or a malicious plan to starve the NHS until the whole bloody lot can be privatised, and to hell with anyone who loses their life while the tories destroy the NHS. Both. They certainly want to privatise the NHS, that is beyond dispute. They can't do that in one stroke (sorry), partly because of capacity, partly cost with private provision being so much more expensive, and partly because the public wouldn't wear it. So it's a difficult path to tread. Part of the game is to underfund just enough. They want to be able to point to funding increases while still falling short of need, so they fail to provide enough to meet the increasing demands of an ageing population. That demoralises staff, and produces recurrent crises which can be blamed on the service itself because "we have increased funding". So there is a creeping process of underfunding, demoralisation, discrediting, and taking opportunities to privatise chunks as and when the opportunity arises. The press are important in this. They have to be relied on to run recurrent stories about failures in the health service without being seen to attack doctors and nurses too directly or too personally. By and large, sections of the press manage to do this - though the Sun today runs something more critical, I see. But although it's a plan, it's not carried out too well. So there's incompetence as well. As for people dying as a result, if you recall that in the 1980s the government of the day were actively planning for scenarios involving the death of tens of millions of UK citizens through nuclear war, while simultaneously pursuing policies which made war more likely, then I don't think we need detain ourselves with notions that a policy wouldn't be pursued if it led to the avoidable death of a few people here and there. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted January 9, 2017 Author Moderator Share Posted January 9, 2017 2 hours ago, peterms said: Both. They certainly want to privatise the NHS, that is beyond dispute. Well yes and no. Some of them do, some of them don't. Sarah Woolaston, who used to be a Doctor in the NHS has been vey critical of Cameron and his privatising chums and their health service "reforms". And she's the head of the Health committe of Parliament (or whatever it's called). She's not alone in her views, though some of them are afraid to be so public in their opposition to what's going on. I agree that the likes of Jeremy C, the Health secretary and various over priveleged tory clearings in the woods do want to sell it off to their friends, and then perhaps take up a post with some private health provider as a "reward". I hope the less avaricious, low key tories prevail, obviously. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 12 minutes ago, blandy said: Well yes and no. Some of them do, some of them don't. Sarah Woolaston, who used to be a Doctor in the NHS has been vey critical of Cameron and his privatising chums and their health service "reforms". And she's the head of the Health committe of Parliament (or whatever it's called). She's not alone in her views, though some of them are afraid to be so public in their opposition to what's going on. I agree that the likes of Jeremy C, the Health secretary and various over priveleged tory clearings in the woods do want to sell it off to their friends, and then perhaps take up a post with some private health provider as a "reward". I hope the less avaricious, low key tories prevail, obviously. It's true that not every single tory is actively seeking to privatise the NHS, and some of them may actually be against it. When Parliament discussed a Bill to limit privatisation of the NHS, Quote Those who voted in favour of the bill included two Conservative and seven Lib Dem rebels. "Rebels". Indeed. Many of them are in favour of NHS privatisation not purely on ideological grounds, like the goggle-eyed fanatics in the Keith Joseph/Oliver Letwin/John Redwood camp, but because they will personally profit from asset-stripping our health service. Quote Ex-health secretary Andrew Lansley to advise firms on healthcare reforms: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/oct/20/andrew-lansley-advise-firms-healthcare-reforms Half of private firms behind NHS privatisation have links to Tories: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/half-private-firms-behind-nhs-5347268#ICID=sharebar_twitter A study by Oxford academics shows there is statistically a 'signficant' relationship between donations to parties and nominations for peerages: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/mar/21/revealed-link-life-peerages-party-donations?CMP=share_btn_tw Full list of MPs with links to private healthcare firms: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/selling-nhs-profit-full-list-4646154 One in five Coalition MPs have links with private firms who could profit from the Government’s NHS reforms. David Cameron, former Health Secretary Andrew Lansley and Jeremy Hunt are among 64 Tory MPs named: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/selling-nhs-profit-tories-liberal-4645961 Tory MP works for firm targeting huge health service deal: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/1billion-nhs-sell-off-scandal-tory-4724959 £1.5 billion has left the NHS and gone into the pockets of just 15 private companies linked to 23 Tory MPs and Lords, who were all able to vote for the Health and Social Care Act: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/oct/03/healthcare-companies-links-tories-nhs-contracts 113 members of House of Lords are paid by financial services firms, 26 by resources firms & 20 by foreign govts. http://t.co/vniazOcg6W So yes, exceptions can be found to everything. Woollaston deserves credit for speaking up. But she is tolerated as a token voice who can be excused on grounds of conscience, as a health professional, and because her interventions don't actually get in the way of doing business. And of course many tories will say nice words about the NHS and the wonderful staff who recently saved one of their constituents, even as they troop through the lobbies to destroy our national asset. But as a general proposition, "Tories support privatising the NHS" would be almost on the same level of probability as "Swans are white". 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted January 9, 2017 Author Moderator Share Posted January 9, 2017 3 minutes ago, peterms said: many tories will say nice words about the NHS and the wonderful staff who recently saved one of their constituents, even as they troop through the lobbies to destroy our national asset. But as a general proposition, "Tories support privatising the NHS" would be almost on the same level of probability as "Swans are white". from your link at most 16 tories voted against the labour motion to limit the involvement of Private companies in the NHS. I loathe the tories, and agree that various tories do want to private it. I just don't think that nearly as many of them actually do as some people seem to think. There's definitely a stand of conservatism that thinks "Privatise everything", bit there's als oa strand that kind of hates the "spivvy, sell it off, brash, Hedge fund" side of their party and just wants (in their view) things to be like they used to be. ANd that includes the NHS being a public asset. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 1 minute ago, blandy said: from your link at most 16 tories voted against the labour motion to limit the involvement of Private companies in the NHS. There was no need. As the piece said, it wasn't going to pass, as a Private Member's Bill. Credit to the two who supported it. For the non-voters, no credit. On your point about not nearly as many tories wanting to privatise it as we think, if that were the case, then there would be a Commons majority against the plans of Mr "Hunt" and chums. Having a mild intellectual preference for keeping the NHS (if indeed they do, which I doubt) is not much use if they vote to dismember it. By their deeds ye shall know them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted January 9, 2017 Author Moderator Share Posted January 9, 2017 30 minutes ago, peterms said: Having a mild intellectual preference for keeping the NHS (if indeed they do, which I doubt) is not much use if they vote to dismember it. when did anyone vote to dismember it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 16 minutes ago, blandy said: when did anyone vote to dismember it? In 2012, when they passed the Health and Social Care Act. This extended the scope of creeping privatisation. Tim Montgomerie wrote at the time that it would cost them the next election, which turned out sadly not to be the case. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ml1dch Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 1 hour ago, peterms said: But as a general proposition, "Tories support privatising the NHS" would be almost on the same level of probability as "Swans are white". Angry swan says you're a racist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 Sarah Woollaston in avian form... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 24 minutes ago, peterms said: In 2012, when they passed the Health and Social Care Act. This extended the scope of creeping privatisation. Tim Montgomerie wrote at the time that it would cost them the next election, which turned out sadly not to be the case. Kings Fund in a rather long piece has a this to say (obviously I'm taking the bits that suit ) but there is more on the link A recent study by the British Medical Journal also found that one-third of the contracts to provide NHS clinical services awarded in the year from April 2013 were won by private providers, but the value of these contracts was only 5 per cent of the total value of all contracts awarded There has been growth in non-NHS provision of care, but there has been no wholesale privatisation of the NHS. The Fund’s view is that who provides the service is less important than the quality and efficiency of the care that is provided. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 Tony, I said "this extended the scope of creeping privatisation", to which you responded "there has been no wholesale privatisation". It's like me saying "That guy just nicked my pint and my meal" and you saying "Yes, but your car is still in the car park. What's the problem?". As I said in an earlier post, there are constraints on the rate at which privatisation can take place, including capacity, the fact that private provision costs more than the NHS, and the willingness of the public to tolerate it. The direction of travel and the political intent is unmistakable and pretty much undisputed. The fact that they can't do it other than incrementally is not to their credit, any more than we would praise a burglar for stripping our house in many visits instead of just the one. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 5 minutes ago, peterms said: Tony, I said "this extended the scope of creeping privatisation", to which you responded "there has been no wholesale privatisation". It's like me saying "That guy just nicked my pint and my meal" and you saying "Yes, but your car is still in the car park. What's the problem?". As I said in an earlier post, there are constraints on the rate at which privatisation can take place, including capacity, the fact that private provision costs more than the NHS, and the willingness of the public to tolerate it. The direction of travel and the political intent is unmistakable and pretty much undisputed. The fact that they can't do it other than incrementally is not to their credit, any more than we would praise a burglar for stripping our house in many visits instead of just the one. You quoted a bill from 2012 ( 4 years ago , give or take ) and cited it as proof of extending the scope of creeping privatisation and that it would cost the 2015 election (not your words , but words you quoted) .. so 3 years (give or take) so I sort took that to mean creeping a bit faster than the Chilcot enquiry , but what sort of time frame did you have in mind for this stealth privatisation , 5 year , 12 years, 50 years ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 Why would anyone counter a claim of 'creeping' privatization (increased scope or not) with a comment from an article saying that there had been no wholesale privatization? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted January 9, 2017 Author Moderator Share Posted January 9, 2017 2 hours ago, ml1dch said: Angry swan says you're a racist. Apropros nothing, all the Swans in Adelaide are black. And rather lovely. Here's one outside the Adelaide Oval Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted January 9, 2017 Author Moderator Share Posted January 9, 2017 1 hour ago, peterms said: Tony, I said "this extended the scope of creeping privatisation", to which you responded "there has been no wholesale privatisation". It's like me saying "That guy just nicked my pint and my meal" and you saying "Yes, but your car is still in the car park. What's the problem?". As I said in an earlier post, there are constraints on the rate at which privatisation can take place, including capacity, the fact that private provision costs more than the NHS, and the willingness of the public to tolerate it. The direction of travel and the political intent is unmistakable and pretty much undisputed. The fact that they can't do it other than incrementally is not to their credit, any more than we would praise a burglar for stripping our house in many visits instead of just the one. What you said was in repsonse to my Quote "when did anyone vote to dismember it? " so to be fair, you've done exactly what you accuse Tony of. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wazzap24 Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 My mum is currently in Good Hope. You only need to spend an hour in there to see just how bad it is. The Red Cross are not overplaying this. word removed Hunty and the rest will never have to suffer it though. I'd quite like it to be mandatory for any serving MP to have to use the NHS and not be allowed to go private. You might see a change in rhetoric then. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 2 hours ago, blandy said: What you said was in repsonse to my so to be fair, you've done exactly what you accuse Tony of. Not at all. "Dismember" is where we are heading. If the Act had introduced, say, privatisation of one service only, you would have a point. As it is, there's a rolling programme, with new tenders happening all the time. As I have said more than once now, it's incremental. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 I used to work in part of the NHS that dealt with estates, new and maintained. That entire division from Architects to site clerk of works, civil engineering and heating engineers was privatised off. I'd put that under 'dismember'. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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