The founding principles of the NHS have long been under attack, but now it seems that some politicians from both Conservative and Labour parties are predicting its impending collapse unless radically reformed. The latter, of course, involves diverting even more money to health care and insurance companies, and propping up a small, inefficient and often […]
Category: Privatisation
Martin Blanchard July 2021 This briefing is not a detailed report of recent privatisation of healthcare in London, but rather examples of the type of privatisation that is occurring with links to details about the companies involved. If these examples are occurring in all five incipient ICSs (North West London -NWL, North Central London-NCL, North […]
Munira Mirza heading up group meeting ‘daily or weekly’ to plan ‘radical NHS shakeup’. Open Democracy 19.11.20 Boris Johnson’s government has for the first time confirmed the existence of a prime ministerial task force which is reportedly planning a “radical shake-up of the NHS”. Freedom of Information disclosures to openDemocracy show the new “No.10 Health and […]
The media recently highlighted the fact that NHS England has announced: “The NHS is set to radically overhaul the way MRI, CT and other diagnostic services are delivered for patients . . . . Community diagnostic hubs or ‘one stop shops’ should be created across the country, away from hospitals, so that patients can receive […]
Dr Applebee proposed the motion by TOWER HAMLETS DIVISION of the BMA: That this meeting, in response to COVID 19, demands that government: i) ensure that workers are not under pressure to attend work either for financial or workforce reasons while they are unwell or self-isolating and at risk of inadvertently passing on the disease; […]
A review of where the UK is in its response to the Covid-19 pandemic 1. Policy failure Richard Horton, editor of the prestigious medical journal ‘The Lancet’, described the management of COVID-19 as the “greatest science policy failure for a generation” in his book on the pandemic. Currently the numbers of newly diagnosed patients are […]
5th July 2020 The 72nd birthday of the NHS takes place in the shadow of the COVID 19 pandemic. The progress of the virus underlines the absolute importance of having an NHS as Bevan intended when it was founded in 1948, a comprehensive health service, publicly funded from general taxation, publicly provided and free at […]
In the middle of March 2020, it was clear that the NHS would not have the capacity to deal with the increased demands of the Covid-19 epidemic. This lack of spare capacity is clear evidence of continuing government failure to invest in the NHS to provide the required flexibility to meet unplanned needs. As a necessary but panic measure to deal […]
June 1 2020 heralded the official start of the easing of the lockdown that has been in place since 23rd March to try to contain the spread of Covid 19. The current reality is that due to the Westminster Government’s repeatedly vague and confusing messaging, compounded by their unwavering support of the Prime Minister’s rule […]
In January 2019, Doctors in Unite issued proposals relating to public health and primary care. This document has now been revised. In the light of COVID-19 the authors believe that if these proposals had been implemented before the pandemic struck then the UK would have been able to respond much more quickly to the need […]
Doctors in Unite 