Humanitarian Crisis in UK

Obviously we know where Jeremy Hunt was today - but he might have disappeared since his speech.

www.independent.co.uk/voices/jeremy-hunt-theresa-may-health-committee-nhs-humanitarian-crisis-a7516216.html

Read a report last week that said 48%of NHS staff admit to sufering depression and/or stress .Sickness levels are at a record high .It is soul destroying feeling you can't do your job and care for your patients properly because of severe understaffing.I fear for the mental health of my daughter who works in the NHS .Jeremy Hunt should be sacked .

And applications to nursing/midwifery courses are well down .Anything to do with abolishing the bursary ?

Trisher

I raised the Francis Report and Mid Staffs Hospital on 'one of the other' durhamjen threads on the NHS recently and you were , shall I say, dismissive of my post at that time too.

Now you have said :-

'It is interesting that such a fuss is still being made about the Stafford hospital which horrendous although it might have been was one hospital in a huge system.'

durhamjen

'It was a fuss.'

I have a very different take on the Francis Report and that period of the NHS than you, durhamjen and probaby others too. The Francis Report DID NOT cover 'just' the Mid Staffs Hospital.

I cannot find the threads that were on Gransnet at the time of the North Staffs problems but without going into detail of a distressing period of my life all I will say is this, as I did on those threads, my mother died in one of the hospitals in the top 10 list of worst hospitals and there were major problems under the Labour government and NHS back then ,

I have tried to find the Gransnet threads in 'Search' on Mid Staffs and the Francis Inquiry/Report to bump them as it appears some posters are happy to forget the horrible problems surrounding the NHS at that time. I will never forget Andy Burnham and the government at that time but I suppose you would think I was 'just making a fuss'.

I will not respond to any posts as it would be futile but I can't let the ignorance of the findings of the Francis Report/Inquiry go unremembered and for the sake of 'honest' reading, not b----y Skawkbox, I suggest people read the Francis Inquiry Report for themselves or listen to the Parliamentary Health Select Committee Meetings which obviously interviewed Francis and other NHS bodies.

I am not defending this government, I am not dismissing the issues surrounding the NHS now but I will remind posters to my dying day to please stop dismissing the problems in our hospitals at that time of the Mid Staffs scandal and most certainly do not accuse those of us who lost family due to negligence to 'stop fussing'.

Stafford Hospital has had its problems.
But we need a County Hospital in our County.
We have marched in our thousands (a point raised by I think by trisher)
We have had for long time a 'sit in protest camp' in the grounds
We have had petitions.
We have had meetings with powers that be.
They say they are listening to us and then in the next breath tell us that they are out sourcing to other hospitals that are all ready stretched.

It seems every week we loose another service there.

I'm sorry if some feel that there is still fuss re Stafford hospital.
But we are living with the consequences.

We are frightened of needing A&E out of hours and having hope the ambulance gets you there in time to another hospital miles away.
And when you get there they have a doctor and a bed!
We are worried for the pregnant mothers, if something goes wrong.
How many times do expectant mothers go in to hospital at their due time to be told 'your not quite there go home and come back when your waters break' etc.
How do they do that when hospitals miles away??
We are worried in case our grandchildren need medical help that is again miles away.

Just days before Stafford hospital closed its evening/night. A&E a friend was rushed to the hospital and happily survived.
if she had to travel all the way up to Stoke she would probably not been here today.

Yes there is a medical crisis all over the UK.
We have in our county been living with it for along time.
I would like to add
It is NOT the fault of the Hospital it is the people in charge.

POGS Thank you for mentioning Andy Burnham in this thread. I've never forgiven him, and never will for his attitude towards Mid Staffs.
I'm sure you remember his attitude towards the woman who first tried to raise the problems that were happening there. Some people have short/ selective memories.

Two wrongs don't make a right!

This is distracting from the current situation in the NHS.

If people still say there are problems with Staffs hospital, I believe them.

I also would say though that I think there is a humanitarian crisis in at least some hospitals. And the Red Cross are quite right to highlight it. Good for them.

Our local hospital regularly announces a black alert.
One of its main problems, among many, is that more and more housing is being built with absolutely no increase in hospital facilities. In fact the opposite.
So the system at many times is unable to cope.
Not as bad as Staffs problems though.

Distracting from the dire performance of the last Labour Government?
In any case, since posters want to 'move swiftly on'.... since then we have had an economic crash to contend with and vast numbers of immigration to the UK, how was the NHS ever expected to do well with that double whammy?
Put taxes up, I hear you cry ( and it is on the cards I bet) but you can understand any government not wanting to do that up to now, and making pay packets even smaller.
On the subject of patients waiting ( and even dying) on trolleys, this is not a new phenomenon and has been happening for a long long time in some hospitals.

POGS am so sorry to hear about your Mother, and there will be other poster on here or lurkers to the forum, that have had similar experiences, which should be remembered when posting insensitively as a few posters have done.

the £500,000 the government gave the Red Cross in 2015 needs topping up!

DD the point about Mid Staffs is valid.

This is not a new problem. Neither is it entirely of the present governments making. Though they certainly have made things even worse.

These facts have to be recognised if we are to move forwards from this ever-worsening situation. And all parties, and their supporters, have to stop blaming each other and understand they have all let the NHS down. Only when inter-party sniping, blaming and the get-one-over-on-the-other-side attitude stop will this problem be tackled effectively.

That of course won't happen. We can't even reach some kind of census on here without taking 'sides' and politicians are just as intransigent.

No hope really,

So the achievements of the Labour government are to be forgotten because of one hospital trust that had real problems, but the chaos resulting from 7 years of Tory cuts has to be blamed on immigrants and the financial crash. I really can't believe that despite all the evidence to the contrary anyone believes that Tories actually believe in the NHS and the welfare state. Listen to someone like Jacob Rees Mogg and his ideas about the state withdrawing and becoming less responsible for every day life. He is the real voice of conservatism and Mrs May is just someone to make the unacceptable palatable.

I'm not dismissing what happened at Mid Staffs and I have every sympathy for POGs after what happened to her mother (and the relatives of other people who died unnecessarily).

My feeling is that this is 'whataboutery'. It seems to me that some people are saying 'It was just as bad under Labour' and trying to undermine/dismiss what's happening now. I have seen for myself how much the services I personally use have deteriorated over the last six years.

My nearest hospital is Addenbrooke's in Cambridge. It's a world class hospital, which was second in the country for patient safety in 2013. In 2015, it was placed in 'special measures' and was deemed inadequate in all categories except personal care. I read the whole report and in almost all areas, the main problem was inadequate staffing. The trust had introduced a new-fangled digital record system, which didn't work properly and had cost millions. Andrew Lansley had praised the system to the hilt when it was introduced, but it almost bankrupted the trust, which had to make staff redundant - hence, the understaffing. My point is that this was an excellent hospital, which had introduced change under pressure without any extra money.

Another factor is that at any one time, an average of just over 7% of beds are blocked by people who don't need to be in hospital, because home care is inadequate in rural Cambridgeshire. I looked at the latest inspection report and this is still a problem, despite improvement in all other areas. The trust is trying to do something about it, but local authorities don't have the money to provide care. Something could be done about that.

I agree with you that we have to move forward and stop the political point scoring and blame.

I think there is hope (well, I don't give up), but we need an effective opposition. Remember 'Education, education, education'? We need an inspirational opposition leader to make an 'NHS NHS NHS' speech.

Assuming this is link is right, or even partly right, I am aghast that it can be dismissed by anyone at all as a "fuss".

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stafford_Hospital_scandal

What was the dfate of that scandal, ankers? And what measures were taken to prevent it happening again?

If it has been put right, and the necessary lessons have been learnt and understood, the scandal THEN cannot be blamed on anyone NOW. That is what people are still doing - quoting that as example of NOW.

In 2005, Jeremy Hunt co-authored a book with Douglas Carswell and Michael Gove (and others) called ‘DIRECT DEMOCRACY – An Agenda for a New Model Party’.

Here are a couple of quotes from the book:

'The problem with the NHS is not one of resources. Rather, it is that it is a centrally run, state monopoly designed over half a century ago.'

'Our ambition should be to break down the barriers between private and public provision, in effect DENATIONALISING the provision of health care in Britain'

The whole book can be downloaded. It's all about minimising the role of the state in public services for ideological reasons. There are no sources for some of the rather spurious claims and no actual explanation of why private providers can do better than the state.

"We actually spend a little bit more than the average for rich countries on our health services

I'm not sure where he's getting his information from but we don't.

The chart on this page, compiled from OECD data clearly shows this.

www.pgpf.org/chart-archive/0006_health-care-oecd

So does this one:

www.kingsfund.org.uk/projects/nhs-in-a-nutshell/health-care-spending-compared

What the chart from the first link shows is that we spend a little more than the OECD average. Which, when you consider this covers all the countries in the world is not very surprising. Or anything to be particularly proud of when you look at what other rich countries spend.

Thinking about 'waste of money' and things like petty pilfering in the NHS I don't think that this is a problem only experienced in the NHS. I think it is probably common to all organisations, public or private. To single this out as a major failing in the NHS is unrealistic.

Did you read the link Elegran? Up to you of course whether you choose to read it.
Some of what you are asking is in the link I think?
Plus there are first hand up to date accounts here, so long as you trust the posters concerned.

Elegran Stafford Hospital A&E is not open 24 hours; this is a hospital in the County town serving about 70,000 people plus surrounding districts. The A&E was closed altogether for under 18s as the paediatric A&E service was deemed unsafe.

Lessons have not been learned.

We are advised on here to march, demonstrate, be active, write to our MPs about the NHS now, but those who did so after the disaster that was Stafford are dismissed as making a fuss on this thread.

I agree that much needs to be done but to dismiss the distress of those who lost relatives through neglect, hospital acquired infections because of the filthy conditions when Labour was in power as a fuss is neither helpful nor compassionate.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7186799.stm
2008 - how long had they been in power then?

www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/4647
2005 - cuts, closures, waste.

I agree that much needs to be done now and, without reading reports in depth, I cannot tell which areas have improved and which have not or which have got worse.

However, the above links and other links given on more recent problems convince me that I agree with Anya that the NHS should be taken out of the political arena and not used as a football between the different parties.

2005:
Shortly after the last general election, health secretary Patricia Hewitt announced that the use of the private sector to carry out NHS operations will double in the next five years. She wants between 10% and 15% of operations to be carried out by the private sector - rising from around 5% now.

If you disagree with privatisation now, then why was there not an outcry then?

I must say I do not disagree with that - having had an operation done on the NHS in a private hospital in about 2001 I was perfectly happy with the treatment I received. DD also had an operation at a BUPA hospital under the NHS - we could not fault the treatment and the waiting time was cut from about 18 months to a couple of weeks.

www.nhsforsale.info/privatisation-list/surgery/the-great-pfi-swindle.html

PFIs - that wonderful way they built new hospitals but now we are paying through the nose with money that could be spent on more medical staff, new drugs etc.

I think my point has just been proved.

Ankers I wasn't asking for information, I wss asking whether YOU knew when the news scandal at Stafford broke. That is relevant to what is happening NOW, and reading the link may not have been relevant when I posted. no I did not read it, but I shall (when I get back from some necessary shopping, my fris=dge and cupboards are bare)

Jalima If lessons have NOT been learnt and neglect and bad procedures still exist, then that IS relevant and disgraceful.

Jalima,

You could add to your list that it was Labour which awarded the contract for Hinchingbrooke Hospital in Huntingdon to Circle. When Circle couldn't make a profit, it handed the hospital back to the NHS to sort out the mess.

I am not claiming and never have claimed that Labour did a brilliant job with the NHS. What I am saying is that it doesn't help to look back and blame or to use past failures as an excuse for current inaction. We need to look forward and stop the political tit-for-tat. It is obvious that the aim has been to privatise the NHS. If you read the book Hunt co-authored, it's also obvious that he wants to introduce an American-style insurance scheme.

The government could start by giving ring-fenced funding to local councils for social care and mental health services rather then having stupid apps which will tell us we have a headache and should take an aspirin...or maybe it's a subarachnoid haemorrhage and we're going to die anyway. In either case, there's no point going to A & E.