Watching the news bulletins last night I was astonished to see that there was a service for the 60th anniversary of the founding of the National Health Service - at which poor old Prince Charles was wheeled out. ITN dispensed with any semblance of impartiality, reporting on how wonderful the NHS is, and how awful things were prior to 1948, in a manner more appropriate to a fascist dictatorship such as North Korea or Cuba than Britain. The sound of Nye Bevan's "dulcit" tones droning over the airwaves confirmed in my mind that the church service had nothing to do with honouring those who work in the health sector. It was a political church service, pure and simple.
The NHS at 60 is a perfect opportunity to look back on what worked and what no longer works. The concept of taxpayer subsidised healthcare for the poorest, or even compulsory saving by taxpayers towards their own healthcare, are probably popular (if wrong). But the notion that the state should be the provider of healthcare, rather than its guarantor, is no longer a given.
Saturday 4th July 2009
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It may no longer be a given, but if the Conservatives don't introduce something radical then the NHS will keep rumbling on as an inefficient state-run monopoly that delivers poor quality and poor value for money.
I was fortunate enough to attend the service, which was very moving and thought provoking. The news obviously didn't show every element of the service, there were readings and speeches from patients and medical pracitioners as well as politicians / civil servants etc. It may not be a perfect system but the service was about giving thanks for all the good work that has been done over the years, all the help that people have received which without the nhs wouldn't have been given. And on the train home i overheard many comments from others who had been, ordinary nurses or patients, who had really appreciated the acknowledgement of the good that is done by everyone involved in providing care and support for millions of patients every week.
Westminster Abbey should be a place solely for things spiritual. The NHS (or more accurately the EWHS* and SHS*) does not come into that category.
Still, it is perhaps not quite as bad as a Concervative Government 'celebrating' the Channel Tunnel in the Abbey, with Mitterand et al. That was truly shocking. But we can probably blame Howe, Hurd and/or the Foreign Office for that!
* England & Wales Health Service, and Scottish Health Service, as I now call them.
What about all the people who've died from MRSA - were they remembered in prayers?
BBC News 24 (or whatever it's called today) featured its own little encomium for the NHS. The main thrust of this seemed to be that medical expertise had improved a bit since the 1940s, allowing wonders such as heart transplants and high-tech fertility treatments. Oddly, however, no one mentioned that healthcare outcomes have improved to a similar or indeed even greater extent in industrialised countries which don't 'enjoy' nationalised healthcare - nor was much attention given to the increasing numbers of Britons who feel driven to 'go private', while of course still bankrolling a system so poor they're unwilling to use it. (This isn't a criticism of those who work in the NHS, by the way, many of whom are even more frustrated by the NHS's awfulness than the poor wretched patients.)
Happy Birthday, NHS.
It was strangely appropriate that people who believe in dogma in the absence of evidence should worship one religion (state health care) at the home of another.
The even more laughable BBC coverage proudly told us that we could soon look forward to going anywhere in Europe for treatment "on the NHS" Regardless of the accuracy of this, how exactly is the NHs providing treatment to someone who goes to France for an operation? Surely there can be no more damning inditement after 10 years of financial splurge, and with money apparently available to pay for threatment, the sainted NHS can't actually do it.
Dear Donal
Prayers and a service to remember the victims of MRSA and other healthcare infections were held on the following day at a tribute to those people and their families which is held annually. We watched as patients, nurses and dignatories left the abbey at the event celebrating the NHS. Health Ministers were sent personal invitations and I took the opportunity to ask Ben Bradshaw and Alan Johnson to attend in person when they were coming out of the Abbey, however they did not attend. The scourge of healthcare infections is a blight on the NHS which is a great institution and I hope that the people giving thanks at the event where Prince Charles and other dignatories attended were said for those who had suffered and been lost to healthcare infections, thank you for your thoughts in remembering them, and those of us left behind.
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