Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
"Health spending will increase by only 0.75% a year to 2021. The slowdown - from the roughly 4% average annual rise since the NHS was founded in 1945 - began with the government's attempt to shrink the deficit in 2010" - Sunday Times, business section, 5 November 2017.
If even the Murdoch press are stating this, how come there are so many NHS funding denialists? Is it only those supporting the government that believe this to be untrue?
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Captain Haddock
- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,070
You Grace,
Is there anything at all that you can think of in the UK which can't be solved by just chucking more money at it? (see NHS, Police, Defence, Education, Social Services, Railways, Highways, Housing etc etc).
Just wondering.
Meanwhile in Wales it's not a case of 'How Green is my Valley' but 'How Green are the Electorate'?
https://twitter.com/twitter/statuses/949960008112005120"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
Oh Captain, my captain. It is OUR money. Tax doesn't belong to the government - it belongs to the people. Why can't we spend it on the areas that matter to us?
A simple analogy: You buy a car. You do not just use it, you pay for its upkeep, you refuel it, you insure it and when it is (like staff members in the NHS) due for retirement, you hope that there is a prepared replacement to seamlessly keep you motoring. That costs money - all of which is expected and accepted.
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Captain Haddock
- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,070
To continue the analogy, having bought my car I don't throw the keys to the first vastly pregnant African arriving at Heathrow with a single ticket and 5$ claiming she is here to go shopping in Lewisham.

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"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
Captain Haddock wrote:To continue the analogy, having bought my car I don't throw the keys to the first vastly pregnant African arriving at Heathrow with a single ticket and 5$ claiming she is here to go shopping in Lewisham.
May I remind you to keep within the bounds of the NATIONAL Health Service. Let's not get hysterical. Let's have a proper grown up debate on the NHS just like Sarah Wollaston MP (Chair of the Health Select Committee) and a qualified GP herself, would endorse.
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Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Jan Higgins
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,875
The Bishop wrote: Let's have a proper grown up debate
Thank you for giving me my first laugh of the day.

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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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Captain Haddock
- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,070
The Bishop wrote:May I remind you to keep within the bounds of the NATIONAL Health Service.
OK, let's get back to the car analogy.
Sixty years ago I build a car. Since then I've spent a small fortune on improvements to it to add electric windows, air conditioning, disc brakes and all the other things I see on foreign cars in the 21st century.
I've also had to extend the seating due to the increase in my family size plus the fact that for some unknown reason I've allowed a load of other people to live in my house.
When I look at my neighbour's cars I note that none of them have copied my design and that their cars are a lot more comfortable people-carriers with quieter more efficient engines and much better fuel economy and do not have the same trouble starting whenever the temperature drops.
Should I consider getting a new car designed for traffic conditions in 2018 or continue trying to keep my much loved jalopy on the road?
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"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
Aha, that is the top of the range car that only a few percent of those within those "foreign" nations can purchase.
According to the
www.commonwealthfund.org study of 11 countries, the NHS came out top...
The rankings
UK
Australia
Netherlands
Norway
New Zealand
Sweden
Switzerland
Germany
Canada
France
United States
I think, though cannot honestly confirm, that those nations listed even fit the stringent criteria that Donald Trump of being non-sh*thole nations.
Oh Captain, my Captain, I do not approve of the PFI contracts within the NHS - I believe we are on the same page there. The question is how do we help improve the service and further promote the excellent front-line service that 'our' NHS provides.
I would like to hear what you feel the 2018 model for the NHS should be. Whilst also pointing out that when the population increases, so does the population's collective tax contributions (income tax, NI, VAT, etc.) we are not just a drain on the NHS!
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Reginald Barrington
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 17 Dec 2014
- Posts: 3,257
Captain Haddock wrote:OK, let's get back to the car analogy.
Sixty years ago I build a car. Since then I've spent a small fortune on improvements to it to add electric windows, air conditioning, disc brakes and all the other things I see on foreign cars in the 21st century.
I've also had to extend the seating due to the increase in my family size plus the fact that for some unknown reason I've allowed a load of other people to live in my house.
When I look at my neighbour's cars I note that none of them have copied my design and that their cars are a lot more comfortable people-carriers with quieter more efficient engines and much better fuel economy and do not have the same trouble starting whenever the temperature drops.
Should I consider getting a new car designed for traffic conditions in 2018 or continue trying to keep my much loved jalopy on the road?
And I would appreciate it if you come and get it off my drive:
Arte et Marte
Captain Haddock
- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,070
PLEASE read the report. I have. And the 2004 report.
We came top since the measures awarded points for stuff like health system quality, efficiency, access to care, equity, and healthy lives. They probably award points for transgender toilets for all I know.
The purpose of a sodding health service is I would suggest primarily to SAVE LIVES I would have thought. THE NHS IS NOT DOING THAT.
We come second to bottom on Mortality Amenable to Health Care (which is better than on 2004 when we came LAST)
As for 'what you feel the 2018 model for the NHS should be' let's just say I'm warming up to the old Fabian idea of eugenics .................

"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Jan Higgins
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,875
I had no idea what "Mortality Amenable to Health Care" meant in simple language so Google came to the rescue, for other dimwits like myself here is their definition.
"Mortality amenable to healthcare. Mortality amenable to healthcare is a measure of the rates of death considered preventable by timely and effective care. Lower rates of mortality amenable to healthcare can indicate an improvement in health system is performance."
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
#10 & #11 is it, in your opinion or indeed expert opinion, due to the NHS staff practise or the ratio of medical staff per capita, or ratio of medical investment per capita?
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
Guest 1881- Registered: 16 Oct 2016
- Posts: 1,071
After Dominic Raab's blatant lie about hospital beds (14,000 have been axed since 2010) Jeremy Corbyn asked this: "Two weeks ago, the Prime Minster told the Commons the NHS had been prepared for the winter, but this week 68 A&E doctors wrote to her saying that patients were dying prematurely because doctors were too busy to treat them. Who should the people believe, those doctors or the Prime Minister?"
So, my question is, can we trust the Tories to keep to the principles of the NHS?
Just because you don't take an interest in politics doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you. PERICLES.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
The cutting back of hospital beds means little in isolation as more and more procedures can be done on outpatients and nobody wants to stay in hospital if they don't have to. The problem lies with inadequate social care for people who need it meaning that patients not needing treatment are filling beds. As for the question the answer is no.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
Captain Haddock
- Location: Marlinspike Hall
- Registered: 8 Oct 2012
- Posts: 8,070
-The NHS will remain a taxpayer-funded system free at the point of use; ACOs are simply about making care more joined-up between different health and care organisations.
Next... .
"We are living in very strange times, and they are likely to get a lot stranger before we bottom out"
Dr. Hunter S Thompson
Ross Miller
- Location: London Road, Dover
- Registered: 17 Sep 2008
- Posts: 3,705
Ah is that "newspeak"?
Seriously though, I agree that the NHS needs to focus on primary care (i.e. hospitals & GPs).
However, alongside that, we need a proper solution to knotty problems such as long term care for the elderly, those with mental health issues and other chronic ailments (inc dependency issues); private provision & "care in the community" has patently not worked as is evident from the emergency services and A&Es being overburdened with these problems.
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"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today." - James Dean
"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength,
While loving someone deeply gives you courage" - Laozi
Judith Roberts- Registered: 15 May 2012
- Posts: 637
As I understand it Primary Healthcare is GPs, dentists etc and Secondary Healthcare is hospitals.
Jan Higgins
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,875
Time for me to have a small rant, why are the elderly constantly blamed for the NHS troubles, it makes me so angry. We might live longer but as a group we are fitter than we have ever been. Are we blamed for the housing shortage because we are living longer taking up valuable homes, no we are not.
I had to go for my yearly check with the practice nurse and noted who was there waiting to see the doctor. There were four others and they were all a lot younger than me, one was foreign who used the interpreter the other three ranged from a young mother to a middle aged gentleman. I was the only oldie who was perfectly well but the system said I had to have that check up as I had not seen a doctor or nurse for well over a year.
I had a chat with my paramedic neighbour the other day about the abuse of A&E and the ambulance service. Again the elderly do not abuse the system, he would prefer us oldies to call an ambulance rather than wait until the last minute when we might be in serious trouble.
I agree we stay in hospital longer because there are not the resources out there. This is down to governments past and present who no longer provide the equivalent of convalescent homes, they used to cater for all ages who are not able to go home for various reasons. My daughter's partner was discharged from hospital far to early because they were so short of beds, this was eighteen months ago, he ended back in hospital for over two weeks, she had to take time off work to look after him.
Sorry for the rant but being old is not the cause of the NHS problems, dishing out money on non illness procedures does not help, neither does poor management at the top.
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
When I use my GPs surgery I would say that elderly people are a minority in the waiting room on average. Younger people sometimes want to see a doctor when a trip to the chemist would suffice whilst older people were brought up in an era when they would put up with minor ailments or wait until they got better in due course.