N.H.S. or Insurance?.

No, it’s the new Papworth, though its location is not that far from Addenbrooke’s

Moggy

And may I ask Moggy, where this new Hospital is being built?.Just as a matter of interest. Is it an “Overspill” Hospital for Addenbrook’s.
Jim.
Lincoln .7

That is my whole point Linc. There aren’t just two pots so the question is, as you so rightly say hypothetical.

Meanwhile from where I am now sitting having dropped Mrs Moggy at her workplace I can see a stonking great hospital in the course of construction.

Moggy

Linc, all good points and I have had a similar experience down here in Kent at a severely criticised hospital. The problem with all of these “quango” inspectorates is that they never take an objective view. They simply assess targets and that is usually no way to gain a true impression of the way institutions work. I am not defending much that is appallingly wrong with the NHS, but I think we need something better than the inspection systems we currently use.

Hi Paul, Despite all the crap being said about Addenbrook’s, I can’t speak highly enough of them. If it were not for their Cardio Vascular Surgeons and team, who operated on me twice, then I wouldn’t be typing this now. The aftercare was brilliant, the only bummer was the food, but what praise can anyone give for Hospital food.
Addenbrook’s is a massive Hospital to run, and I can in a way see why they are losing one and a half Mill a month. The Nurses and Staff there have to pay on a daily basis to park their own cars in the public car parks to go to work, that alone is a fiasco, as when they can’t find a place to park, they are late for work, and then when they DO find a place to park, they get fined for being late. But this is what they have to face every day.They are worth every penny, even if it is a loser at the end of the day.
They have the expertise and Staff that can perform Operations that outlining Hospitals can’t, and as such, they are overloaded.
What we, the general Public never get to hear, is how many lives they save every year, no, we just hear how much money they are losing. So once again, just how much, is your life or mine worth?.Even 3 yrs after my last major Op, I still am under the watchful eye of that Hospital, and I am an old git they could save money on by not giving me the high standard of aftercare they do.
Jim
Lincoln .7

Go to Addenbrookes Jim you will probably have your Op cancelled to May 2045!

There is little more tiresome than perpetual use of the NHS and education as an excuse for not spending money on something that the writer does not approve of.

“With the money spent on xxxxxxxx we could build three hundred hospitals and two hundred schools.”

Yes, we know that, but we do have to have something other than hospitals and schools in the country. Likewise John’s harking on about the foreign aid budget. It exists, we are committed to it, live with it.

Moggy

I seem to remember Cameron promising that he would build 16 new Hospitals. Anyone recall just how many have been built on his watch?. So young Moggy, it begs a question, hypothetically speaking, we have two pots, both are nearly M.T. one has NHS on it, the other has Foreign Aid on the other, YOU need a life saving Operation, but YOU have to chose which is the better of the sum total of both pots, would you have the Op, or give it away to some other Country?.remembering, you can’t have it both ways.
Jim
Lincoln .7

The corrupt and unsustainable procurement and ‘jobs for the boys’ are what need to go, I agree. A way to do that is to stop the flow of contracts out.. I have seen a steady migration of senior management types leave their public sector posts to do the same job for the same council as a one-man or one-woman private consultancy ‘company’ for double the money.

In one case a social care Director has a second private consultancy job as an advisor to her own department.

In another an outsourcing company – Capita – run (as an outsourced service) the procurement department for a large Metropolitan Council. Whenever a new IT contract is competed for, the contract (as decided on by the Capita Procurement division) is awarded to the Capita IT division.. at a vastly inflated price. I can’t speak for the NHS but I suspect it is a similar picture.

Disgraceful is inadequate to describe this news item. But then, we have our own homegrown version. Life extending drugs being denied to cancer sufferers on the dubious grounds of cost/benefit but, we can still afford to divert 900 million of the overseas aid budget of 12 billion, to Syria, effectively ignoring the plight of our NHS patients.

But that said if my heart condition was terminal and the said drugs as in the expensive cancer ones do, gave me an extra months life would I want that? Difficult, but probably not.

Not a plot, nothing to plot against. Just a mechanism that has evolved. No conspiracy, it’s just what happens when you make public services with public funding an available cash cow for private companies. The fact it is allowed to happen is simply a facet of the Government of the time representing those such a system benefits more than those it does not. That is not a plot as such.

Not that I disagree with your sentiment, but the private sector is just a drop in the ocean of NHS problems. Internal inefficiencies, an utterly corrupt and unsustainable procurement system and the culture of golden handshakes and ‘jobs for the boys’ will be costing the taxpayer untold millions, if not billions per year.

The whole thing needs to be pared back. I admit that I don’t have the answers, but it cannot continue the way it is.

There is little more tiresome than perpetual use of the NHS and education as an excuse for not spending money on something that the writer does not approve of.

“With the money spent on xxxxxxxx we could build three hundred hospitals and two hundred schools.”

Yes, we know that, but we do have to have something other than hospitals and schools in the country. Likewise John’s harking on about the foreign aid budget. It exists, we are committed to it, live with it.

Moggy

Disgraceful is inadequate to describe this news item. But then, we have our own homegrown version. Life extending drugs being denied to cancer sufferers on the dubious grounds of cost/benefit but, we can still afford to divert 900 million of the overseas aid budget of 12 billion, to Syria, effectively ignoring the plight of our NHS patients.

There is no link between NHS and Foreign aid budgets as you well know. I would have thought you would be in favour of cost/benefit analysis for NHS treatment as you seem keen to reduce the goverment deficit.

You will have to try harder

One of the reasons for the astonishing costs involved in healthcare in the US can be found in this sorry tale of how pure capitalism is careless with peoples lives
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/hedge-funder-buys-rights-to-drug-used-by-aids-patients-and-raises-price-from-1350-to-750-per-pill-10511690.html

Disgraceful is inadequate to describe this news item. But then, we have our own homegrown version. Life extending drugs being denied to cancer sufferers on the dubious grounds of cost/benefit but, we can still afford to divert 900 million of the overseas aid budget of 12 billion, to Syria, effectively ignoring the plight of our NHS patients.

Struggling to get my head round the economics of this…..’reduce the income to the NHS’?

How does the NHS derive any ‘income’ from the work that they do?

Confused me too, and we still don’t seem to have had an answer.

Moggy

One of the reasons for the astonishing costs involved in healthcare in the US can be found in this sorry tale of how pure capitalism is careless with peoples lives
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/hedge-funder-buys-rights-to-drug-used-by-aids-patients-and-raises-price-from-1350-to-750-per-pill-10511690.html

I cannot fault the service I got, it was faultless and quick, from admission to treatment and release was one week while they investigated and treated my heart condition, in that time I had an angiogram and a angioplasty treatment and various scans which involved three stents inserting, I was then released home knowing that after 6 weeks I would be recalled for another procedure to unblock and stent the other artery, because I am home alone I was admitted for the night and released the following day so they could monitor my incision. I now have follow ups booked with my doctor and the consultant that carried out the procedure…
And all on the NHS in a new clean hospital manned by dedicated skilled staff. The room was a four man with on suite and on my second visit a private room with on suite.

:apologetic:

I think even a cursory analysis of the US system would be an indictment of it.

They spend spend twice as much per capita for no demonstrable improvement in healthcare outcomes.

The largest cause of bankruptcy in the USA is medical bills.

MOST of these bankruptcies are from people that HAVE health insurance.

Large excess payments can leave people thousands of dollars out of pocket for their healthcare, even with insurance.

If you insurance is tied to your job (as it often is in the US) then your employer has even more power over the average worker, leaving them more vulnerable to exploitation. It also means that losing your job also means you lose affordable healthcare – not a good combination.

The NHS is far from perfect, and maybe the NHS using some private provision could work, but it’s something I think we should guard jealously.

Not a plot, nothing to plot against. Just a mechanism that has evolved. No conspiracy, it’s just what happens when you make public services with public funding an available cash cow for private companies. The fact it is allowed to happen is simply a facet of the Government of the time representing those such a system benefits more than those it does not. That is not a plot as such.

So it’s all some big corrupt plot is it; so that public money ends-up in the hands of ‘shareholders’! :rolleyes: