Motorists, Equity & Unity Party
Opinion Column Archives
No. 8 Reducing the waiting lists in the NHS
We have the Prime Minister telling us that they intend to send patients to Private Hospitals in order to reduce the waiting lists. That would be find if it wasn’t for the fact that the government has been sending NHS patients to Private Hospitals for the last 18 months or more, using tax-payers money (not NHS funds) in order to make it appear that they have done a splendid job and therefore you should vote for them at the next General Election. The first question I would ask is, is it fair to use finance from other sources in order to promote the New Labour Party ? Of course it would be acceptable to use NHS resources to send patients private if there was a bottleneck in some specialities in certain areas of the country but, if this practice is carried out nationally then surely we are creeping, slowly but surely into privatisation; actually funding the private sector with money that should be spent within the NHS on nurses, doctors, support staff, and equipment.
Where is the line to be drawn between treatment within the NHS and treatment within the private sector ? The government are simply massaging the waiting list figures for their own electoral purposes. At least they are coming clean with regard to sending patients private if they are given a third term. The question then becomes, for how long are we going to be sending NHS patients private, starving the NHS of essential funds.
The problem for patients is not so much the waiting times as the cancellation of operations due to hospitals having to achieve the targets that the present government set. Because of the target time set for Accident & Emergency the bed situation in the hospital becomes critical and planned operations are having to be cancelled on a regular basis. We now hear that the government intend fining hospitals for not rescheduling an operation within a certain time and the money raised in that manner to be used to fund the operation at an alternative hospital. What exactly do they expect to happen as a result of putting the hospital administration under these types of pressure ? Already we know that the main cause of MRSA is the number of patients crammed into wards (they receive visitors which are not screened), making the task even more difficult to overcome. Strictly speaking, visitors to hospital wards should be required to leave their outdoor clothes in a cloakroom provided by the hospital and they should be required to wear an appropriately coloured (to distinguish them from staff) overall coat when visiting wards. This may sound draconian but dying of hospital induced infections is itself a pretty dire situation. Staffing of such an operation wouldn’t require anything but basic education in hygiene. The overalls would be laundered after use.
If the government wishes to reduce waiting lists then it is vital that they stop using NHS funds outside of the service. By setting these targets, almost a new one every 6 months, the morale of staff is beginning to suffer. The evidence of this is the number of nursing staff that call off sick. This is the indicator that things are not right. Starving the service of funds only makes things worse. There are legitimate ways of raising funds within the NHS which will be discussed after the General Election on May 5th.
Where is the line to be drawn between treatment within the NHS and treatment within the private sector ? The government are simply massaging the waiting list figures for their own electoral purposes. At least they are coming clean with regard to sending patients private if they are given a third term. The question then becomes, for how long are we going to be sending NHS patients private, starving the NHS of essential funds.
The problem for patients is not so much the waiting times as the cancellation of operations due to hospitals having to achieve the targets that the present government set. Because of the target time set for Accident & Emergency the bed situation in the hospital becomes critical and planned operations are having to be cancelled on a regular basis. We now hear that the government intend fining hospitals for not rescheduling an operation within a certain time and the money raised in that manner to be used to fund the operation at an alternative hospital. What exactly do they expect to happen as a result of putting the hospital administration under these types of pressure ? Already we know that the main cause of MRSA is the number of patients crammed into wards (they receive visitors which are not screened), making the task even more difficult to overcome. Strictly speaking, visitors to hospital wards should be required to leave their outdoor clothes in a cloakroom provided by the hospital and they should be required to wear an appropriately coloured (to distinguish them from staff) overall coat when visiting wards. This may sound draconian but dying of hospital induced infections is itself a pretty dire situation. Staffing of such an operation wouldn’t require anything but basic education in hygiene. The overalls would be laundered after use.
If the government wishes to reduce waiting lists then it is vital that they stop using NHS funds outside of the service. By setting these targets, almost a new one every 6 months, the morale of staff is beginning to suffer. The evidence of this is the number of nursing staff that call off sick. This is the indicator that things are not right. Starving the service of funds only makes things worse. There are legitimate ways of raising funds within the NHS which will be discussed after the General Election on May 5th.
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