Dismantling the NHS led to the current crisis

There is a crisis in the NHS.

Unelected Tory PM Theresa May prefers to dismiss claims by the Red Cross that the NHS is facing a humanitarian crisis. Tory Health Minister Jeremy Hunt has gone to ground.

So Mrs May tell patients left on trolleys in hospital corridors as our National Health Service fails to meet demands that there is no crisis.

Just how did we get to this point?

The following was written in 2012 and was titled "dismantling NHS services."

"The UK NHS is under threat. Do not believe me? Well read on.

Hospitals across the UK are cutting staff numbers. By and large this is being achieved through an amalgamation of the services provided. Those hospitals which have not yet achieved Foundation Trust status have to streamline in order to do so. Yet Foundation Trusts are not always the best way forward. There have been some appalling stories of late regarding the failures of certain Foundation Trust Hospitals.

As hospital wards amalgamate beds are lost.

Some hospital trusts have made a commitment to cutting the number of hospital beds they provide during the next five years. [Now it is January 2017 the chickens are coming home to roost]

So where will all the patients go?

More often than not UK hospital wards are bursting at the seams. They operate a traffic light system for bed availability, Red Alert being dire. However recently the dreaded Black Alert has been more common place.

This means that the bed situation is beyond critical.

In other words patients are queued up on trolleys waiting for beds.

This tends to herald an earlier discharge than planned for some patients, and yes you have guessed it, an earlier re-admittance.

[If you are discharged simply because another patient needs your bed is that acceptable?]

Hospitals though are in a no win situation.

The cuts are demanded by the coalition government's budget changes and NHS reform plans.

Money is going to General Practitioners for them to buy in services and it is expected that some patients will therefore bypass the NHS.

Private hospitals with Tory supporters at the helm are no longer fiction.

This will be the way forward once NHS reform is fully operational.

The NHS will of course still pick up the slack. The patients who are not easily cured or treated. This will have the knock on effect of making the NHS appear a poor alternative and undermine their services further.

Those of you sceptical that the Tory Lib Dem coalition government are dismantling the NHS need to open your eyes.

By the time you realise what is happening it will be too late.

Once beds are lost they will be unlikely to be reopened. After all once skilled staff have been axed who will take charge of re-opened wards?

David Cameron came to office on a dodgy mandate. He promised the NHS was safe in his hands. That is one of a long line of promises which he has broken. Perhaps it was lies rather than broken promises?

Add to that the fact that in truth he did not have a majority to govern the UK and his arrogance beggars belief.

Dismantling institutions such as the NHS should be down to a public referendum not the whim of a minority government."

The above was written in June 2012. In December of that year this blogger walked out of her NHS clerical job of 13 years as she could not stand it any longer. She had around 15 months until retirement but for the sake of her health quit.

Other members of staff became physically and mentally ill working under duress in a constantly changing working environment; one where if you work there long enough you will see each change come around again.

Money and resources wasted making the NHS better or making it fail?

​It now looks like the big plan was failure and the Tory government is about to succeed on that score.

Never let the Liberal Democrats try to score political points on the current NHS crisis. They helped make it when they opted to partner the Tories in government for five years.

More;
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/nhs-privatisation-charges-professionals-in-house-agency-a7426966.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-38541462
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/nov/11/virgin-care-700m-contract-200-nhs-social-care-services-bath-somerset