The evil Tory policy that ‘nudges’ people into paying for their healthcare
Justin Madders, shadow health secretary, says the two-tier system is ‘unforgivable’.
It is no surprise that more people are paying for NHS healthcare after the Conservatives allowed hospitals to raise nearly half their funds that way.
What else can they do when the same Conservatives have engineered impossibly high waiting lists for state-funded treatment?
The underfunding of the NHS, coupled with the provision of this ‘opt-out’ option, can only be an attempt to ‘nudge’ people into considering paying for healthcare – and to get them used to the idea.
In other words, it is an attempt to soften us up for total NHS privatisation.
I don’t blame anybody who takes the ‘pay’ route – no doubt they have very good, possibly life-saving, reasons for doing so.
But it would be wrong to use such people as indicators that the UK as a whole will accept the full privatisation of the NHS.
The option is only available to people who can afford it; the poor must still wait. Under fully-private care, the poor would not be able to afford it and would never receive it.
And who knows what sacrifices people are making in order to buy private healthcare from the NHS?
So healthcare would revert to being something only available to the rich and the rest of us would suffer.
But they would sell it to us as an affordable option because of those who are paying now – not because they want to, but because they have to.
That is Tory health policy, and it is evil.
Income received by NHS hospital trusts from private patients has risen by 23% in the last four years, as waiting lists for non-paying patients have soared.
Under the government’s reforms, hospitals have been given the right to raise 49% of their funds through non-NHS work, often from patients seeking to avoid waiting for surgery. Prior to this, there had been a 2% cap on income that could be raised from private patients.
Ministers revealed in parliament that in 2015-16, hospitals in England received £558m from patients choosing to pay private – up from £454m four years earlier. The figures come as the number of patients waiting more than 18 weeks for treatment has increased by 54% during the same period. Of those treated in October, more than 360,000 patients had been waiting for 18 weeks or more for treatment, according to the latest data from NHS England, compared to 234,030 in October 2011.
Source: NHS cashes in on private payers as waiting lists soar | Society | The Guardian
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I think the tories have forgotten that disease doesnt stop at the gates of the Estate. If disease is allowed to run rampant then they are just as vunerable as the rest of us.
Poor health care means a sick workforce. Robots dont play nursemaid or makeup person, Waiters can spit in the food. WW2 found many men unfit fot the armed forces. Shame if there is no police force/army to protect the wealthy cos they are too weak.
The right to raise 49% has became it is essential to keep your hospital ope that you raise 49% add the that the slash trash and privatise plans and we could be without the NHS before the decade is out. This fits in nicely with he tories “for hard working people” mantra, aka arbeit macht frei because those feckless idlers with what the deem to be disabilities or pretend to have a sickness or incapacity won’t be blocking beds hard workers to use to get back to work quicker.
Would also be good if they reintroduced tax relief to those that enjoyed company private medical schemes if that is cunning plan. Many NHS Hospitals now have private wings which are as busy as the NHS facilities in terms of wait times etc and of course right next to emergency services when their private consultants screw up their private jobs. We know the consequences from the Dental privatisation when that was introduced and was never revisited when it all screwed up and left the poorest without readily available dentistry. Baaah humbug
Not surgery, but in Oct I was referred for a full NHS adult ASD assessment following a preliminary assessment by a psychiatrist. The outcome will affect all ‘treatment’ and care pathways I’m currently under (many!). And the current waiting time in my Health Trust (massive intake of breath, and another) : 2 years. Yes, *** 2 YEARS ***!!!!! And to top that, I am not actually allowed to be added to the list as it is currently FULL. No, I can’t afford private as an Untermensch social security claimant. Options, anyone? (apart from screaming which currently, due to my existing and I believe wrong cluster of psych diagnoses, would result in me being sectioned). Another diazepam or several for now methinks.
Looks more like a shove than a nudge to me!
The principle of “free at the point of need” helps to make our NHS the world’s best health service. To make desperately needed care depend on ability to pay is evil.
That was their plan all along!