Altruism & Calamity: Private failure & NHS rescue.

What is Altruism: 

Man is drowning. A banker watching took out two £50 note and threw it to the drowning man’s wife: “Get him some private swimming lessons!”

There was a public life-guard, he jumped in and pull the man out and saved him.

The wife tried to give him the £100. He refused: “All part of the public service.”

NHS Altruism: 

I give you Choice and Personalised Health Budget, what else do you want!

Calamity: remember Southern Cross?

The Life-Guard: Clare Gerada

The best views are free and the best things in life are often free.

©Am Ang Zhang 2011

A reprint:

Imagine a society where you take your beloved car to a Private Garage for some repair work and it turns out that the Private Garage did a very bad job and did serious damage to the engine, transmission and other unknown bits. Now imagine that there is a State run National Car Service that will put right everything and at no cost to you and no charge to the Private Garage that did the damage in the first place.

Would it not be wonderful?

In health care, you already have that right now and it is called the National Health Service. It is free even if the damage was done by a private doctor and treatment will be for as long as it takes. The private doctor will not be charged any fee and some even continues to practice here or in other countries.

Soon, such a National Car Health Service may not be there!

The Guardian
David Cameron is to "completely change" public services, bringing in a "presumption" that private companies, voluntary groups or charities are as able to run schools, hospitals and many other council services as the state.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph about the plans…………..the prime minister says he is seeking to end the "state's monopoly" over public services, with only the security forces and judiciary exempt.

Scotland

The Herald Scotland:

In 2002, Denise checked into a private clinic for what should have been a straightforward procedure to remove fat from her stomach. Afterwards she spent six weeks in intensive care (in NHS hospital), the surgeon having repeatedly punctured her bowel.

 

                                                                                                  

Herald Scotland Rheagan Hendry

Read all about it here>>>>

Broughton

In the new world order of our NHS, private provider (AQW)for commercial reasons need not let the public have access to information about their activities etc, and even the doctors they provide. As they say, be very afraid.

Another case happened a little while back and again it was a private cosmetic operation that went wrong and the NHS tried to look after the patient for over six months.   Read all about it here>>>>

Even as we like our NHS as much as our woods: looks like private providers for public services is in the PM's mind. Sometimes it is public (taxpayer) money for private failures: catastrophic failures when it is someone's life.

The NHS is totemic. It is about a pool of altruism and it speaks to who we are as a nation. It is the mortar that binds us in the way that the American constitution does the American people. For us, it is about this system. It really is the place where we are "all in it together"-one of the few places, it would seem at the moment. Doctors get 88 per cent trust ratings with the public, while politicians get 14 per cent. The vast majority of doctors are saying to us, "Withdraw this Bill". We should be listening.

                                                                                    Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws