Cost of vet treatment petition for animal NHS

[Speakeasy]

Everyone is suffering from the cost of living crisis and it is hitting pet owners too, especially with the cost of vet treatment rising rapidly. There are two petitions running asking for an Animal NHS, one on the UK government site and one of the Welsh government site. People in Wales can sign both but everyone else can only sign the UK one.

Please consider signing and sharing the petitions because it might just help people to keep the pets they consider to be their family.

The UK petition is at https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/635352
and reads:

Create an Animal NHS for pensioners, those on low incomes, and for emergenciesIntroduce an Animal NHS for the animals of pensioners, those on means tested benefits and for animals who present with emergencies. Creating a national service to meet the needs of these animals would allow veterinary charities to help a new range of clients who are struggling to make ends meet.
More details
No animal owner could be unaware of soaring veterinary costs. One of the most common reasons that the SHG sees for animal welfare prosecutions that is failure to seek veterinary advice, either at all, or quickly enough, even if the animal is booked in for when the next pay cheque arrives.
A recent survey found that nearly all UK vets that responded have seen animals during the last 12 months that should have been presented earlier. Financial problems were given as the main reason in 91% of cases.
We can and must do better.

The Welsh petition is at https://petitions.senedd.wales/petitions/245403
and reads:

Create an Animal NHSIntroduce an Animal NHS, if only for the animals of pensioners, those on means tested benefits and for animals who present with emergencies.
If private vets could access general government funding it would allow the veterinary charities to help a new range of clients who are struggling to make ends meet.
More details
No animal owner could be unaware of soaring veterinary costs. One of the most prolific reasons for animal welfare prosecutions that come into The SHG is failure to seek veterinary advice, either at all, or quickly enough, even when the animal is booked in for when the next pay cheque arrives. Nearly all vets have seen animals during the last 12 months that should have been presented earlier.
www.vettimes.co.uk/news/report-shows-growing-number-of-clients-delaying-treatment-for-their-pets/
Financial problems were given as the main reason in 91% of cases.
Times are hard and there are many calls on government finances but the proven benefits of animal companionship means that an Animal NHS would pay for itself many times over, if only by reducing demands on the courts and legal aid.
Wales can and must do better.

@Speakeasy how would it be funded ?
I would object to paying anything for other people's pets.

But who would fund it? There’s no magic money tree.
We can barely fund a human NHS.

That’s probably Speakeasy replying to herself!!

Also, can car and home owners have free repairs when things go wrong?
Proper govt trained plumbers and decorators of course.

Not only do the PDSA report their clients to the RSPCA they are also working with the RSPCA who are planning to stop providing any subsidised veterinary care. We will see what happens in future when the special fund for those who can't access PDSA care runs out.

https://www.vettimes.co.uk/news/pdsa-and-rspca-announce-partnership/

How will this nhs vet thing be funded @Speakeasy

Please state where I said that pets cure paranoid schizophrenia. Pets are known to improve health and stress issues along with cardiovascular problems such as blood pressure. If people lose the animals that give them such comfort then the NHS will inevitably have to pick up the pieces.

You should look at the petition site. There is a steady trickle of people signing the petition which has moved from page 24 to page 10. Certainly doing better than over half of the petitions that are started. There is a long way to go, so let's see what happens over time.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions?page=10&state=open

Now who is being irrational in their desperation to denigrate the idea! No, it isn't me.

Thanks.. You have dipped a toe into the hornet's nest though.

To be successful. From the first week a petition needs something like 50 signatures a day.

Did you read this at all before you posted it?

Two charities have announced a new partnership they claim will protect affordable care provision for low-income pet owners and ensure rescued animals get help more quickly.

The centre mentioned btw in Fosbury park needs a partnership so it can continue to operate. RSPCA haven’t invested in the building and equipment for decades. They will still do affordable care.

RSPCA centres across the country will now be run by PDSA who will still carry on with financially supporting those owners who need it, including things like free neutering. As always the support will be means tested.

And what’s wrong with animal abuse getting reported? I support any group, charity, person, institution etc that reports abuse. RSPCA, like others who work on protection won’t take away the pet unless absolute necessary. They will work with the owners including sign posting to where can be gained.

@Speakeasy sorry, can't quote within a quote but you said:

Not only do the PDSA report their clients to the RSPCA they are also working with the RSPCA who are planning to stop providing any subsidised veterinary care. We will see what happens in future when the special fund for those who can't access PDSA care runs out.

www.vettimes.co.uk/news/pdsa-and-rspca-announce-partnership/*

Did you read that article? Nothing at all about reporting clients! The PDSA has taken over the running of a london RSPCA animal hospital. This is due to rspca funding and a change in their focus. What is this "special fund" you refer to?

It was about the PDSA and RSPCA combining. RSPCA is pulling out of most things it does and is hoping to get powers from government and concentrate on prosecutions. Read the article for the special fund.

Have read the article several times. Nothing wrong with RSPCA going back to trying to protect animals.
for those who don’t want to click or having issues

Two charities have announced a new partnership they claim will protect affordable care provision for low-income pet owners and ensure rescued animals get help more quickly.
The initiative between PDSA and the RSPCA comes as the latter group reported a 24% increase in abandoned animals during the first seven months of this year alone.
The agreement affects RSPCA-affiliated owners in London, Birmingham, Manchester and Merthyr Tydfil.
No job lossesOfficials said the agreement was drawn up following the RSPCA’s decision to stop providing subsidised veterinary care, so it can focus its resources on helping the animals it rescues from cruelty or neglect.
The deal will see PDSA take over the running of the Finsbury Park Animal Hospital in North London, where it said it also plans to make “significant” investment.
Staff are currently being consulted on a transfer proposal and officials insist no job losses are planned.
Fee supportThe groups said all current RSPCA-affiliated owners in Birmingham, plus most in Manchester, will be able to access services at PDSA Pet Hospitals from November.
Others, including those registered at Merthyr Tydfil, will be able to access a £1 million treatment fund and the charities insist they will both continue to offer fee support.
Richard Hooker, PDSA’s director of veterinary services, said: “This partnership strengthens the strategic direction of both charities, enabling us both to expand our reach and benefit – and ensuring every pound donated works harder.”
‘Powerful partnership’In its latest figures, the RSPCA said it had received 22,908 abandonment reports between January and July this year, up from 18,375 over the same period last year.
Chief executive Chris Sherwood said: “This is a powerful partnership which helps both people and animals at a time when our services are needed more than ever due to the cost of living crisis.
“By working together with PDSA, we can both focus on our strengths, our core charitable objectives, and ours is rescuing the thousands of animals most in need, those who have no one else.”
It is also hoped that some PDSA hospitals will be able to treat some of the animals rescued by the RSPCA in the future.

What is wrong with the RSPCA prosecuting? Just this:

https://shgconsultationresponses.wordpress.com/2020/11/08/the-shg-response-to-the-justice-committee-call-for-evidence-on-private-prosecutions-safeguards/

Was anyone having difficulties in accessing the article? However, since you have copied it over in its entirety perhaps those unable to find reference to the special fund might like to look back and see if they can spot this in the article:

"Others, including those registered at Merthyr Tydfil, will be able to access a £1 million treatment fund and the charities insist they will both continue to offer fee support."

We will see if they continue to offer support when it runs out.

Did you miss this part?

Richard Hooker, PDSA’s director of veterinary services, said: “This partnership strengthens the strategic direction of both charities, enabling us both to expand our reach and benefit – and ensuring every pound donated works harder.”

As long as people are still donating how will money run out?
Instead of giving a specific grant to Finsbury Park the money is spent on the building and equipment.

Did you also miss the part where they will continue to do FREE treatment

can you answer the question that several people have asked - where will the money come from to pay for this NHS service? Will it come from nhs existing funding?

Yea not signing into Wordpress.

Why do you need to sign in?

The RSPCA made a whole swathe of people redundant not so long back due they claimed, to financial problems. The reasons behind the collaboration lie in the general drop in donations across the charity sector. The RSPCA can't afford to continue providing subsidised (not free) vet care. They hope to use PDSA services instead of their own for animals in their possession in future. How long will the PDSA be able to fund the services it does today? Will it give priority to RSPCA animals over owned pets?

They will continue to do free treatment in the places they were already doing it. Those are limited. The deal has already fallen through in terms of Finsbury Park. The PDSA had planned to acquire it for an "undisclosed price".

The money will come from general taxation funded by the savings in human health and happiness enabling people to work and contribute to society where they might otherwise have been too depressed and unwell to do anything but add to the problems of the NHS. Despite the claims made by people here it is well accepted that animals help people who are unwell.

https://www.pdsa.org.uk/pet-help-and-advice/our-services/service-changes/changes-at-rpsca-s-finsbury-park-animal-hospital#:~:text=The%20proposal%20for%20PDSA%20to,much%20greater%20than%20originally%20anticipated.

Nope. I’d love pets but I’ve chosen not to cos I work full time so unfair to leave them and also because they are so expensive to care for. I pay taxes etc and that’s the right thing for us as a society. I don’t have kids but I fully support paying Into the pot to support children/young people for the growth of society. Lots of things like the NHS, education, council funding needs attention way before Id agree to pay for someone else’s pets.

Pets are a luxury, you shouldn’t get one of you can’t afford to care for them. I’d support stricter rules on pet ownership/insurance etc. Like previous have said too many people own pets that they don’t look after, can’t afford or just don’t give a shit about

Despite the claims made by people here it is well accepted that animals help people who are unwell.

You're being disingenuous. What claims? Nobody has disputed that in some circumstances, pet ownership can be helpful for aspects of maintaining health — they can help with loneliness, lower stress, incentivise gentle exercise, and so on.

But you said that an animal NHS would be:

Far cheaper than funding mental health professionals and mopping up the mess when families implode. Pets help people far more than anything else the government provides.

The only way to make sense of your argument here is that you think that a national programme to make taxpayers fund free vet care, for the pets people chose to have, would somehow help those with serious mental illness (i.e. the main group in need of mental health professionals) far more than actual healthcare would, and also that an animal NHS would remove the need for big chunks of social services.

You think that providing vet care for millions of pets would be cheaper than providing psychiatric care for humans with mental illness, and social services for families in trouble. Maybe it would. But those people would still have mental illness, and those families would still have problems.

What message are you sending to people like me, people with serious mental illness who sometimes need the help of mental health professionals, when you tell us we don't actually need healthcare for those illnesses? When you tell us that money would be better spent on other people's pets than on us?

Quite right @JarByTheDoor and what about those who can't have a pet, due to allergies, living arrangements, just don't like them? Do they get told 'oh well, sorry you don't get help'.

So an unworkable initiative.

Mh care is on the bones of its arse. There isn’t enough money to support those under mh care. Hence the shortage of wards and hospitals. Hence limited access and massive waiting lists. Hence so many slip through the cracks.

We don’t see mh people for bants. We seek help so we are safe around ourselves and other people for example.

The last thing you want on the street with a dog when I’m not medicated or under mh support is me. Or anyone else like me who has psychotic tendencies and has idealisations of causing real harm to people.

Many of us are unable to take care of our own basic needs, never mind provide proper care for a pet.

Should my carers and support workers also be tasked with the job of caring for pets? What about when we are sectioned or on a ward because of the physical conditions?

The link probably wants me to sign into Wordpress because I am signed out.

Exactly Round. These mental health professionals include the psychiatrists who are needed to make diagnoses, recommend treatments, evaluate response to treatment, prescribe specialist drugs, and lots more; the psychiatric nurses who monitor patients both in hospital and in the community, deliver some interventions, support patients with their symptoms and medications, coordinate the overall care package and lots more; the psychiatric social workers who do many of the same sorts of things, but from a social work standpoint; psychologists and psychotherapists who provide many different types of specialist interventions both inside and outside hospitals; occupational therapists who work inside and outside hospital using OT philosophies and interventions to help people live meaningful lives… and most of this work is with people who are very seriously, sometimes life-threateningly mentally unwell, with the kind of serious mental illness that means the professionals working with them need specialist training to be of any help.

Sure, in addition to these, there's also some wellbeing practitioners and CBT therapists working in IAPT services, and some counsellors and other mental health professionals working outwith the NHS, who might see people with a broader range of difficulties, including some with minor social problems, loneliness, and mild mental health problems, a few of which might be somewhat helped by pet ownership.

But for the most part, the mental health professionals working in NHS community and inpatient mental health services, those who make up the bulk of the most highly-trained and expensive types of mental health professionals, are spending all their time dealing with people who have real, severe, life-threatening and life-ruining psychiatric illness. People who, yes, might well also benefit from having a pet, but who will need psychiatric healthcare regardless.

We're desperately short of mental healthcare and mental health professionals in our health service. If you're getting any significant input from mental health professionals, chances are you were never experiencing the kind of difficulty that could be prevented or dealt with by getting a fucking cat.