A privatised NHS.

maddison · May 11, 2013

Bruce Wayne said:
The drug development process does need looking at. Because right now it typically takes 4-5 years to bring a drug through the trial process, it costs a few hundred million. Chuck in the costs of the drugs that don't make it through, and pharma companies are left having to charge big bucks whilst their drug is on patent to recoup their costs and make a profit. As a result, we tend to get drugs that try and solve problems for large numbers of people, because they need a big market.

If that whole process could be made easier not only would costs be lower, but we might also get the personalised drugs that were promised when the genome was mapped.

It's a quirk of the system that a sizeable chunk of the nurses trained via UK universities don't end up working in the NHS, so large numbers are imported from abroad, many of whom aren't trained in the same way. Not to say they're awful, but they're often very different, be it due to their training or the culture they've come from. Many will get a couple of months of training and then be expected to be up to speed on the UK way of doing things, which isn't all that likely. Not ideal.

I'm very pro preventative healthcare, and it totally shocks me that hte medical industry look to prescribe instead of treating the route cause. You can nip onto a few cancer charity websites for example and see bugger all about certain cancers being preventable through lifestyle choices. Likewise you see auto immune diseases such as Rheumatoid arthritis being treated with prescription drugs, when taking out the route cause of the problem would give people improved quality of life far beyond pharmaceuticals ever will

I understand what you're saying about drugs, but the reality is the perfect drug doesn't cure anything. It simply makes it so that you have to come back for more; it makes you dependant on it.

If drugs were used properly I'd agree, but often life saving treatments are ignored because they're not a drug that's marketable or profitable.

Bruce Wayne · May 11, 2013

Aye, not wrong there. Diabetes is another biggie. Seen a huge rise in recent years, purely because of the poor lifestyles people adopt. Throw in the alcohol and tobacco related illnesses and the NHS would be much better off if folks just ate a better diet and exercised a bit. Save the treatment for people that really need rather than those that were silly sods.

maddison · May 11, 2013

Bruce Wayne said:
Aye, not wrong there. Diabetes is another biggie. Seen a huge rise in recent years, purely because of the poor lifestyles people adopt. Throw in the alcohol and tobacco related illnesses and the NHS would be much better off if folks just ate a better diet and exercised a bit. Save the treatment for people that really need rather than those that were silly sods.

Exactly, the scary thing about Diabetes is that the diabetes charities recommend diets for diabetics that do nothing to help their health. Type 2 diabetes is curable with a low carb diet, ok you have to stay on that diet for the rest of your life, but you'd have no symptoms. Type 1 diabetes has seen successful treatment with different dietary applications, which the diabetic associations totally flout and give a relatively high carb diet as the way a type 1 diabetic should eat, baffling!

The harsh reality is that if you get ill, you need to do your own research because your GP isn't likely to help you much.

Bruce Wayne · May 11, 2013

Quite. A lot of the time, the GPs are looking at the same websites for information as are available to you as the public.

maddison · May 11, 2013

Bruce Wayne said:
Quite. A lot of the time, the GPs are looking at the same websites for information as are available to you as the public.

Or they simply don't look.

Woolly Blue · May 11, 2013

EFCNIK said:
And just putting it out there, I speak to nurses every day and it is alarming how ****ing thick and sometimes rude some of them are. Some of their english is diabolical too.

Your popcorning skills aren't what they were lad.
My missus is a nurse and even I didn't bite.

Top marks for spelling diabolical right though (y)

Bruce Wayne · May 12, 2013

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-22481151

Pity they don't go into details as to why they're so short-staffed though. They create the impression that it's all down to a lack of money to hire staff, when the reality is very different.

evilwebby · May 12, 2013

Like with any public service, if costs are socialised then you will get overconsumption, which leaves fewer resources for those who really need it. To say that something must be protected "at any cost" is unhelpful when the whole concept is flawed and unsustainable. You may as well have argued that the old USSR should have been saved no matter what the cost.

People criticize the US model, and rightly so, but US are well on the path to socialised healthcare as it with Medicare, Medicaid, and now Obamacare. If they had left the entirely in the hands of the private sector then things would be very different - and very much better.

btw, of course I am not knocking the health professionals who work in the NHS. They are as able and as any and worthy of our praise. But the reality is that they are doing their good work aboard a ship that is slowly sinking.

degsy · May 12, 2013

Whitebootman said:
Agreed totally. The NHS should be protected at all costs. It's the most valuable thing we all own.

Totally agree, but there must be, without throwing the baby out with the bath water and getting all political one way or the other a more efficient way of running it....some sort of mid ground which combines the 'good' parts ( if there are any ) from all political and economic sprectrums....I suspect it will do the pc mob in but a return to the original way it was run where Matron ( oooh matron yes yes I know, get over it, move on ) ran the wards, not doctors or accountants or bureaucrats...with cleaners that cleaned and workers that actually worked

roydo · May 12, 2013

Mrs R works in the NHS, after 15 years working in the private sector; it is a million miles away from being a privatised organisation!

A massive problem is Joe Publics expectations of the NHS. "I have a headache, I need to see my GP" type of stuff. Needs managing better cos loads of "managers" do not contribute at all, and the medical staff should be freed up to do what they do best.

Biggest employer in Europe isnt it? Hardly understaffed IMO.