Health of thousands threatened because privatised NHS contractor misplaced documents

This is a direct result of the privatisation the Conservatives (and Liberal Democrats) have brought into the National health Service in England.

The instant an important job is handed to a private contractor, one can expect it to go wrong.

Look at G4S with the Olympics, or Atos/Capita with work capability assessments.

This is a serious matter because it implies harm to NHS patients.

The public were told back in 2011-12, when the Health and Social Care Act was being pushed through Parliament, that the changes it proposed would make the health service better.

Can anybody doubt that this was a lie?

Worst of all is the fact that no Conservative will stand up and speak against the government for what it has done. They know the changes were intended to screw money out of the poor – via the taxes that pay for NHS services (and, eventually, the health insurance they’ll need when the NHS is finally privatised) – and that’s what they want.

So the vast majority of the English people are left with a health service that will harm their health because it has been turned into a money machine for corrupt Conservatives.

Will nobody stand up and defend the NHS and the nation’s health?

Thousands of NHS patients may have come to harm because of an administrative mix-up, says NHS England.

[Around] 500,000 documents containing medical information, including cancer test results, were mistakenly put in storage rather than being sent to the GP or filed in the patients’ records.

An investigation is under way, focusing on the estimated 2,500 patients who may have been adversely affected and need further medical checks.

So far, no harm has been reported.

The error occurred when a mail redirection company hired by the NHS failed to pass on documents that had either been incorrectly addressed or needed re-routing because the patient had moved to a new GP surgery.

The company, NHS Shared Business Services, has expressed regret for the failings, which occurred between 2011 and 2016 in the East Midlands, the South West and north-east London.

Source: NHS misplaced half a million patient documents – BBC News

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6 thoughts on “Health of thousands threatened because privatised NHS contractor misplaced documents

  1. NMac

    This is not just a one-off incident. It seem that over a period of five years this company has “lost” many thousands of documents in different areas of the country. It must be corporate negligence and it should be fully investigated. The company is not fit for purpose.

  2. Dez

    Probably the famous NHS procurement teams had not taken this extra work into account when knocking up another quickie privatisation scam and the problem just got parked as neither side wanted to give ground……so once again joe public gets stuffed by clueless civil servants and greedy privatisation grabbers. Watch this space there will be loads more coming out of the woodwork hopefully the whistle blowers will keep getting their own back for poor pay and lower benefits.

  3. rotzeichen

    Once again thank you Mike, it can’t be said too often, people need to wake up, the private sector destroys jobs and the economy, We no longer have a manufacturing base of any substance down to Thatcher’s privatisation plans.

    I recently took out a virgin telephone and internet ISP, because they were the only company that could provide me with fibre broadband, thinking it would be better than telephone wire broadband, needless to say there was no difference, I later learn I could have bought a WiFi extender, which I now have that would have worked before.

    Needless to say I did not know that my house with brick walls would make a difference, but these companies will telly and sell you anything, so long as they get their profits, and you have to find this all out for yourself.

    Oh where is the GPO ???

    Those were the days.

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