Reminder: We have a health secretary – and a government – that wants to privatise the NHS
Matt Hancock: Turning his back on decent health care.
Andrew Lansley introduced a law to privatise the health service by stealth; Jeremy Hunt part-wrote a book in support of it. Why should we think Matt Hancock is any different?
Answer: We shouldn’t. Look:
Health Secretary Matt Hancock has been accused of being “in hock to fringe right wingers” after teaming up with a think tank who want to close hospitals and ramp up NHS workers’ hours
The top Tory is today launching a report by right wingers the Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA), calling for more automation in the Health Service.
The Taxpayers’ Alliance? A think tank? That’s over-exaggerating their role considerably. These are far-right Tories who want to pay as little tax as possible by cutting the state’s contribution to services – to nothing, if possible.
Introducing the report, Mr Hancock is expected to say technology can “transform the way we deliver public services” and free nurses up “to do more of what they love and do so well: treating and caring for patients.”
This means the TPA wants to introduce mechanical error into healthcare, making it far more possible for patients to be wrongly-diagnosed, ill-treated and even allowed to die.
But the TPA’s website calls for a dramatic reduction in the number of Hospitals and called for the NHS to move to an “insurance-based model.”
So not only do they want your health to be in the care of machines that simply won’t know what they’re doing – consider the daft tick-box “work capability assessments” that have terminated the lives of so many sick, disabled and vulnerable benefit claimants – but they want you to pay through-the-nose for that care.
And, judging from the criminal conviction against the Unum Corporation – the US insurance company that influenced successive governments into creating a system that tries to convince people their illnesses are in their minds rather than real – the plan is to swindle you out of your money and then deny you the care that it is supposed to fund.
It also calls for NHS staff to be exempted from parts of the EU Working Time Directive, which regulates the amount of hours people can work in a week.
So anybody stupid enough to remain an employee of the health service under Tory control will be worked to the bone – risking a slew of suicides (except the NHS is currently experiencing such an epidemic, due to the diabolical policies already introduced by the Tories).
The report claims the health service and adult social care sector could save a combined £18.5 billion by 2030 through increased use of technology.
The only things that won’t be saved are lives.
Source: Tory Matt Hancock teams up with think tank who want NHS replaced with insurance – Mirror Online
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Is this what we’ve got to look forward to. Even the US people have finally had enough. Wouldn’t it be ironic if the Tories privatised our NHS just as the US nationalise theirs.
Demanding Medicare for All, Nurses Use Band-Aids to Plaster GoFundMe Pages to Big Pharma Headquarters
“Nobody should have a GoFundMe account to pay for their healthcare, and we’re here to make sure that that stops.”
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/04/29/demanding-medicare-all-nurses-use-band-aids-plaster-gofundme-pages-big-pharma
I encourage everyone to listen to this.
The USA have the most expensive healthcare system in the world but what people don’t realise is that this so called ‘private’ system annually costs the US government more per head than the health care systems in northern Europe which are free at the point of use.
Bernie Sanders and the cost of having a baby
More or Less: Behind the Stats
Bernie Sanders, a Senator in the United States and one of the front-runners in the campaign to be the Democratic presidential candidate, said on Twitter that it costs $12,000 to have a baby in his country. He compared that figure to Finland, where he said it costs $60. In this edition of More or Less, Tim Harford looks at whether Sanders has got his figures right. With Carol Sakala of US organisation Childbirth Connection and Mika Gissler of the National Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p077rqh9
Keen observers of NHS privatisation should keep an eye on Babylon Health Care.
This mix of technology and privatisation is a perfect example of how private healthcare creams off profitable patients and leaves the NHS to look after the rest:-
“Destabilization of local health economy
In a March 2018 article written for Pulse, Dr Simon Brownleader, chair of Tower Hamlets GP Care Group, Dr Sam Everington, chair of Tower Hamlets CCG and Dr Jackie Applebee, chair of Tower Hamlets LMC, discussed the damage done to the local CCG by the GP at Hand model of business.
The article notes that GPs rely on risk pooling and cross subsidy in that the capitation fee for younger fitter patients, who consult less often, provides the funds to care for the more complex and elderly. Operating models like GP at Hand threaten this system and risk diverting resources away from those who need them most to those who need them least.”
http://www.nhsforsale.info/private-providers/private-gp-companies/babylon-health.html
Vested interest declaration:- My spouse is a full time NHS GP partner; a threatened species in the “jewel in the crown” of the NHS and one of those who will be left caring for the vulnerable people who aren’t deemed profitable to private healthcare.
“Cherry-picking
Babylon has advertised its GP at Hand service being suitable for ‘people of all ages whether you are in good health or not’, but its site lists 10 types of patients that the service may be ‘less appropriate for’. This includes patients with complex mental health conditions, learning difficulties, pregnant women or frail elderly.
Both the RCGP and BMA criticised the scheme for “cherry picking” younger, healthier patients, leaving other GP practices to deal with patients requiring more complex care.”
http://www.nhsforsale.info/private-providers/private-gp-companies/babylon-health.html
I tried explaining to a couple of relations the fact that the Tories are determined to sell off the NHS, but I was not believed. Very worrying that some people are oblivious and don’t appear to care.
I’m an ex-nurse who gave it up because of Thatcher bringing in managers from the private sector then later bad health.
Part of the technoloy mentioned are GP video consultations which can be performed by any doctor, anywhere in the world, regardless of the physical and cultural subtleties that only a face-to-face consultation can pick up and diagnose.
Increased use of prescribing nurses and private pharmacy consultations will also force our proud NHS service into a two-tier third world / private status.
I have a really bad skin condition, and I was told I would have to wait 6 MONTHS for an NHS appointment -but I can get a private appointment in 2 weeks if I’m prepared to pay. This is what they want, people paying (because they are desparate and can’t get an NHS appointment) so that they can say the public accepts this so privatisation is OK.
Mike
Can you spot any similarities with your own case?
https://labourlist.org/2019/04/sarwar-calls-for-reform-and-devolution-of-labours-disciplinary-process/