What are your thoughts on privatising the NHS? Good or bad?

[Supernova23]

I would also love some input from those who have lived in countries that have private healthcare systems. Is it better or worse in your country?

For context, I love the prinicple of the NHS. I’m an NHS nurse. I also like a massive chunk of NHS nurses and doctors, think of looking for a way out on a daily basis. The lure of going abroad tempts me daily.

But as we know, we live on a tiny over populated island. People are living longer and getting sicker. People also abuse the system on a daily basis. I’ve been kicked, hit, spat at, called every name under the sun. I’ve been threatened numerous times. Me and my colleagues have been threatened by a maniac with a machete.

We are haemorrhaging staff on a daily basis. People either leave or go off long term sick. I can’t blame them.

Patients are becoming more medically complex with multiple co morbidities. In the nicest possible way, advances in medicine has meant that people who would have kicked the bucket long ago, are now people kept alive due to modern medicine. People are also getting much, much larger; this makes them more complex to manage in every sense. Even with basic bog standard care. We frequently have patients so large it takes at least 4 people reposition them. You try finding 4 spare hands on the wards; it’s a nightmare.

In my hospital alone, every single ward has multiple complex long stay patients that have been on the wards for 6+ months. In some cases it’s a year or more. The cost of these stays often runs into the hundreds of thousands, perhaps even millions, and is obviously reducing the number of patients we can admit.

I could ramble on. The system has been at breaking point for years. Would privatising the NHS improve it? Or is that cloud cuckoo land?

I have given birth in an NHS hospital and had the pre- and postnatal care courtesy of the NHS and am eternally grateful for the care I and my baby received, for free.

1 - good for you, because the report finds that for many many women and children it is NOT a safe experience, let alone a positive one

2 - it wasn’t free

It was free to me at the point of delivery. I'm a happy tax payer - insurance, not so much.

You’re not going to be happy when you hear about national insurance in that case..

I wouldn't have a problem if the UK decided to adopt a system similar to, let's say, France.

But if anyone thinks the UK is going to get anything else than the USA system, I have a bridge to sell you. USA is the model that politicians here have been eyeing for a long time, because many of them (and not just Conservatives) have strong financial interests in, and ties with companies from the American health system. That's the whole point of dismantling the NHS and destroying the service to the point where people start saying "please, privatise it, do something! Anything!".

The idea is for these politicians to bring their American friends and funders over here and give them free reign. We will absolutely not be getting the regulations that keep costs on the user down in other European countries.

Also, the debate on it is pointless at this point because it's already in motion.

You seem to have a really narrow definition of privatisation, one that doesn’t exist anywhere, even the US, which has hybrid public/private model. You also don’t seem to understand how the system works today. The NHS is already partially privatised. It isn’t really a question of private vs state, but what combination under what funding model that bears discussion as the current system isn’t really working.

1 - good for you, because the report finds that for many many women and children it is NOT a safe experience, let alone a positive one

A huge proportion of those many, many, women will also be taxpayers @meimei80 and I doubt very much they are happy to pay tax to be treated so horrendously and unsafely, but who cares about them eh as long as you are happy.

One persons good experience does not outweigh someone else's bad experience.

The privatisation that’s been happening in the NHS for years already is disastrous, eg clerical support farmed out, causing a longer chain of communication and therefore more mistakes.

But the main problem is that privatisation has to cost more. Because money has to pour out to the shareholders.

All privatisations divert money out of services into private ownership, for that reason. And we all suffer from this country’s disastrous privatisations of the railways, utilities, even our water supply.

National insurance is essentially a tax.

If noone else has could you provide some examples thanks

No, but I find it staggering that some of you think privatising the NHS would lead to better healthcare, very, very scary!

And my point stands: privatising a system of essential services does not lead to better service for the user.

I am a huge admirer of the NHS- and really sad and disgusted even, that it is being stripped to the bone.

If there is to be some form of privatisation, then it just cannot ever be on the USA model where a huge proportion of the population falls right through the net.

Any system must ensure that the weakest in society have access to healthcare, and that the difference between private and 'State' is about exact choice of surgeon/doctor, clinic or hospital, private room, TV and fancy menu- and NOT about access to decent healthcare for ALL.

And without penalty for health issues, pre-existing or genetic, etc, which must all be covered by basic healthcare.

The system has been at breaking point for years. Would privatising the NHS improve it?

Considering the NHS isn't run for profit, and private contractors are, I'd say the chances are slim. More than half of the NHS is already contracted out and that doesn't seem to be working too well.

The imaginary private suppliers would have to do everything the NHS does, including the critical care they currently avoid as it's expensive. And they would have to do that while returning massive profits to their shareholders.

American health behemoths are drooling to get control of the British health service. Nobody thinks that's because they want to make us all better.

The sad fact is that we WILL end up with a US style of privatised healthcare because too many people aren't willing to even consider any form of alternative insurance backed or part pay system akin to most of Europe, Canada nor Australia.

The reluctance to accept a transition to a sustainable system is what will cause the NHS to collapse in its current form, as more and more people turn to the exact type of privatised/insured system akin to the US, not just patients, but doctors and nurses too! After all, it appears that a significant number of GPs are reducing their NHS hours and turning to do private shifts on a "paid for" basis which is just the tip of the oncoming iceberg.

We're basically sleep walking into the US style simply because so many people want to keep the existing, unsustainable and failing NHS and refuse any notion of change.

And my point stands: privatising a system of essential services does not lead to better service for the user.

I'll say it again no-one is advocating for full privatisation. People are advocating for a better and different system such as those found across Europe (and in other parts of the world) which are a mix of private and public and are regulated regarding costs and standards. The healthcare systems across Europe are an order of magnitude better than the NHS so it does work and leads to better services for the user.

To achieve that a lot would have to change including the attitude of the public in the UK. The sub standard health care that is all too frequently provided by the NHS is unacceptable, it shouldn't be tolerated just because it is on occasion brilliant for some users, it needs a major overhaul just throwing more money at the current entity will not solve the problems with it.

And my point stands: privatising a system of essential services does not lead to better service for the user

those of us lucky enough to access private healthcare today beg to differ. Currently pursuing dual assessments for dd (because the state will not recognise a private diagnosis even though done by an nhs practitioner- madness!) and her private assessment will be done before the NHS referral paperwork is even completed. It is then a 2-3 year wait to get the nhs assessment.

That is my fear @taxguru people need to get rid of the idea that the NHS is world beating and a sacred cow and are too blinkered to look at the far better alternatives and how they operate and work in Europe and other parts of the world.

I maintain though that my experience of NHS services, and that of my family, has always been good, so I don't think it's fair to say the system is failing overall, any more than repeating that European healthcare models are some kind of utopian paradise. I have experience of the healthcare system in a couple of European countries some years ago and it really wasn't what many of you describe.

Well, we can draw our conclusions from the experience of your family, or we can look that the government’s own data and report after report that conclude the system is failing.

Well, that's your individual experience (while someone chastised me for sharing mine). My DC was also referred to a private assessment for neurodiversity some time ago, which was conducted entirely online without anyone ever meeting my child, so the assessment didn't really result in a proper diagnosis.

And in another context someone I know was sent to a private GP through a workplace healthcare system following a disclosure of a historic sexual assault. The person is gay and was subjected to homophobic treatment which exacerbated their trauma.

And you think the current government is objective and not at all biased in this? How about the government's report on racism in recent years, claiming that the UK is not institutionally racist?

I had bloody brilliant care thanks to a private consultant who actually had time to listen to me and, brace for it, read my notes. I had been completely failed by my gp surgery, merry-go-round of doctors and a Kafkaesque, computer-says-no, admin system that made getting an appointment impossible.

@meimei80 the nhs isn’t meeting its own (not very ambitious) targets in most areas. This isn’t about politics - I think one of the few things all political parties agree with is the poor state of the nhs. I’m glad you’ve had good experiences so far, but you have to be wilfully blinkered to insist that everything is just fine with the nhs.

It's a fucking awful idea to privatise the NHS.