Northerner
Admin (Retired)
- Relationship to Diabetes
- Type 1
The NHS has much to celebrate as it enters its ?golden years?. But it also faces formidable fiscal, demographic and public health challenges as austerity bites
The NHS has just has reached its 65th birthday. Until a few years ago, we might have expected our well-worn and well-loved regime of GPs, A&Es and PCTS to be settling down in its golden years into a period of lowest ever waiting lists, historically high satisfaction rates, and fairly decent performance on a range of measures.
But the economic downturn, a new government determined to bring the deficit down as rapidly as possible and a backdrop of demographic change accelerating from the mid-2000s has torn up the NHS?s retirement plan. It has brought to the fore uncomfortable truths: that our beloved health system was becoming more and more costly, while productivity was stubbornly low.
http://opinion.publicfinance.co.uk/2013/09/nhs-in-sickness-and-austerity/
The NHS has just has reached its 65th birthday. Until a few years ago, we might have expected our well-worn and well-loved regime of GPs, A&Es and PCTS to be settling down in its golden years into a period of lowest ever waiting lists, historically high satisfaction rates, and fairly decent performance on a range of measures.
But the economic downturn, a new government determined to bring the deficit down as rapidly as possible and a backdrop of demographic change accelerating from the mid-2000s has torn up the NHS?s retirement plan. It has brought to the fore uncomfortable truths: that our beloved health system was becoming more and more costly, while productivity was stubbornly low.
http://opinion.publicfinance.co.uk/2013/09/nhs-in-sickness-and-austerity/