Evidence (??) based politics takes another hit

Dr Peter Samuel puts the Scottish cat amongst the Lansley pigeons The NHS in England may be in turmoil, but a major new academic study claims its Scottish equivalent should serve as a role model for the public sector. According to the findings of a two-year report, post-devolution healthcare in Scotland represents a ?ground-breaking? approach….

Continue Reading

Clive’s critique v Coalition’s codswallop re privatisation

The government’s health reforms fulfil commonly accepted criteria for privatisation. Repeated government denials about NHS privatisation don’t stand up to scrutiny. In response to widespread criticism of the proposed reforms of the NHS in England, the health secretary, Andrew Lansley, the prime minister, David Cameron, the deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg, and the chancellor of….

Continue Reading

Peter Fisher writing in The Guardian

In the Response column (29th April) Dr Howard Stoate* sets the record straight showing that David Cameron was wrong, as well as patronizing, at PMQ. However Dr Stoate’s explanation goes much further in undermining the justification for the Health and Social Care Bill, which is claimed to be that of giving a bigger role for….

Continue Reading

Who is writing the obituary of the NHS?

Were you aware that David http://pharmacy-no-rx.net/viagra_generic.html Nicholson was a one-time active member of the communist party and also emptied the nation’s lunatic asylums by chucking their inmates back into the community? Like Beeching (the railways’ executioner) but wearing a White Paper coat. Now he is the NHS Supremo, heading up the latest super-quango i.e. the….

Continue Reading

The Plot Against the NHS by Colin Leys

This lecture, given at Goldsmiths College, is based on the book The Plot Against the NHS, by Colin Leys and Stewart Player, published on April 14th. The common view of the changes proposed in the government’s Health and Social Care Bill is that they would be the most radical changes ever made to the NHS…..

Continue Reading

WR Positive Doctors

Although one would expect the current ills of the NHS to be multi-factorial it has been suggested that much of this is down to the Wayne Rooney syndrome, where the exorbitant financial demands of superstar footballers and their tetchy relationships with managers are bankrupting football clubs1. It was also suggested that the NHS in the….

Continue Reading

BMJ Editorial underlining the stupidity of rushing through NHS reforms

“Dr” Lansley’s Monster Tony Delamothe, deputy editor Fiona Godlee, editor in chief The British Medical Journal London WC1H 9JRT, UK What do you call a government that embarks on the biggest upheaval of the NHS in its 63 year history, at breakneck speed, while simultaneously trying to make unprecedented financial savings? The politically correct answer….

Continue Reading

The truth about the lies that encouraged NHS PFIs

Labour ministers only paid £5 billion of the £65 billion “spent” on building more than 100 hospitals between 1997 and 2010. The rest of the money, some £60 billion, must still be repaid by the taxpayer – with some of the gigantic debt lasting for more than 30 years.   The highest profile case concerns….

Continue Reading

Absence of evidence base for NHS reforms in England

The rule of ignorance: a polemic on medicine, English health service policy, and history. by John V Pickstone, research professor Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine University of Manchester Manchester M13 9PL, UK Over the past two centuries dogmatism and quackery have been substantially reduced in clinical medicine, albeit unevenly. Over recent….

Continue Reading

Private finance initiatives during NHS austerity

Ring fencing of private finance initiative payments prioritises investor returns over patient care and calls for tighter monitoring and renegotiation. The NHS is facing serious revenue pressures if it is to meet the target of £15bn-20bn efficiency savings by 2013-4. One important pressure for trust budgets in England is the annual private finance initiative (PFI)….

Continue Reading
MENU