NHS - Blog Posts
As a British person living with severe M.E., (plus fibromyalgia and some other issues), I would ask that you please sign and share this petition to get Royal Devon and Exeter NHS Foundation Trust to make accommodations for Alice Barrett, who has very severe M.E. and P.O.T.S. and is currently being treated in Exeter Hospital.
They are refusing to feed her via a nasogastric tube in such a way that takes into account her specific needs - and despite an M.E. specialist saying it's safe to do so - because it isn't in accordance with their hospital guidelines.
Alice needs help, so that she can be fed in a way that won't compromise her health, and potentially permanently worsen her symptoms.
Please sign and share this petition!
Petition · Save Alice Barrett's Life · Change.org
Edit: I paid to blaze this post, so it would reach as many people as possible, but sadly, the Tumblr moderators have rejected this, so this post is not sponsored as I intended - I don't know why. If Alice's family and friends see this post, please know that I tried! 🤷🏻♀️
Wei ying, stop bullying Lan zhan .
Jc is such a mood
Shshehw this is CANNON
small brain: nie huaisang owns pretty songbirds and is a birdwatcher
normal brain: nie huaisang owns parrots and crows too
big brain: nie huaisang, with his love of birds, is a falconer in his spare time and has birds of prey hanging out in qinghe. They all hate JGY who is well aware of this dilemma
galaxy brain: nie huaisang owns a (horrible) goose. It behaves for him and him alone. Everyone else is convinced its a demon from hell but NHS refuses to listen
The best post I've seen
I finally watched Fatal Journey and I made a bunch of funny screenshots so enjoy [part 1]
Keep reading
he looked so fucking breathtaking istg 🪭💚
NHS does not have a mini doll. He cannot be held gently like baby (or whatever the fuck sort of MK-Ultra recreation games TikTok plays with their mini dolls.) However, we still can cherish his digital image.
the first time Huaisang came to lotus pier, he made a flower crown from the lotus’ and wore it as a crown. Jiang Cheng was going to tell him off for picking all of them, until he saw how pretty Huaisang looked in purple…
Mermaid Huaisang… Nie Koisang… idek but HERE HE IS!
Huaisang in the TGCF manhua style?? He’s just so….
I grew up in the UK. As a teenager, I inadvertently lacerated my index finger; an injury that necessitated emergency medical intervention, followed by surgery to repair the two tendons I had severed.
The total cost to myself and my family: £0.
A few years later, I was employed; and I am lead to understand that around 11 - 12% of my income was taxed in the form of National Insurance (which pays for the NHS; plus a number of other significant social services).
...
I then moved to the US; where I contracted a series of common respiratory infections that, unfortunately, would routinely lead to such complications as bronchitis, pneumonia, and (on one memorable occasion), pleurisy.
My first major introduction to the exorbitant cost of American-style, privately-funded healthcare came when, during one of these instances, I needed a chest x-ray; for which I paid $400 out of my own pocket (equivalent, at the time, to a month's rent).
There was a later instance in which a family member was experiencing breathing difficulties, and was directed to the ER. The medical professionals involved ordered virtually every test in their arsenal (as they were not privy to, nor concerned, with the costs involved). Our private health insurer refused to pay for these, citing the need to investigate a possible preexisting condition.
That one event cost us $15,000.
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At my company, a mid-level employee is paid a salary of $60,000. They then have the option to purchase a mid-range private health insurance plan with coverage of all family members. This costs $600 a month; 12% of their income.
So far, there is relative parity with the NHS.
However: the plan also includes a $3,750 deductible; and a $7,500 out-of-pocket maximum. That is to say: until you reach the first threshold, the insurer pays little to nothing; and it is only when you reach the second threshold that they will pay for the entirety of your care.
(And this does not account for out-of-network care; i.e. conducted by medical providers that do not have a contract with the health insurer specifying payment rates. The out-of-network thresholds are tracked separately; and both are on the order of tens of thousands of dollars.)
So really, in the event that you actually need to exercise your health insurance, you are potentially paying up to 24.5% of your income on healthcare.
But wait, there's more!
The aforementioned $600 per month isn't the full insurance premium; merely the part the employee pays. The employer also pays a portion - another $1,600 per month.
(This is, of course, part of the employee's overall compensation package; but most Americans don't think of it as such, as the expense circumvents their paycheck. Just one of the many ways by which the true cost of private health insurance is kept opaque.)
So really, our hypothetical mid-level employee receives $79,200 per year in compensation; of which a minimum of 33% goes to healthcare (and as much as 42% if you actually need to exercise said healthcare).
(Now to be fair: a family health plan would cover our employee's partner; so their contribution of income would be 0%. Assuming that they earn a similar salary however, you are still looking at an average cost of between 16.5% and 21% for each partner.)
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The American healthcare system is a travesty; one where health insurers and (other various middlemen) demand an enormous portion of American income, while interfering with (and frequently preventing) access to care.
The simple reality is that private industry will, in any given context, prioritize profit; and that in certain sectors of service, this will place the needs of industry in direct conflict with those in need of said service.
Put another way: to make a dollar of profit in the healthcare industry, you must take it from someone that has paid for and needs healthcare; and then you must choose to deny said healthcare, and keep it for yourself. It is the vampiric exploitation of a group of people particularly unequipped to fight back.
The people of the UK should seek to defend, tooth and nail, any and every attempt to not only privatize the NHS in general, but especially at the hands of the same US health insurers that have so successfully raised costs and lowered health outcomes.
The NHS will last as long as there are folk left to fight for it” – Aneurin Bevan
I’m no fan of Keir Starmer or Rishi Sunak. Sunak is completely out of touch with ordinary people and Starmer will promise just about anything to get himself into power and then break those promise when it suits him. However when it comes to the future of the NHS I feel it will be safer under a Labour government than one run by free market, neo-liberal Tories.
From a purely selfish perspective - something the Conservative Party excels at - the NHS saves all of us a small fortune. When your child needs medical care it is free at the point of use; when your parents need medical care it is free at the point of use; and when YOU need medical care it is free at the point of use.
Of course we pay for this through taxes and national insurance contributions but the clue is in the phrase “national insurance”. Medical treatment in Britain, is, at the moment, paid for through collective funding. It is a system based on community, social responsibility, and the old fashioned concept of caring for your neighbour. . Aneurin Bevan, the "Father of the NHS” said:
“No society can legitimately call itself civilized if a sick person is denied medical aid because of lack of means."
It is a sad fact that Conservative Party members, many of them rich individuals who can afford private medical treatment, have been undermining the NHS because of their unwavering adherence to the ideological belief that all things run by private enterprise are good while all public sector institutions are bad. . The Tory’s will, of course deny this, claiming the NHS is save in their hands and that they have no plans to privatise it.
Lets look at the facts.
Despite Prime Minister David Cameron promising there would be no cuts to the NHS this was the headline in the Daily Mirror when the Conservatives took over from Labour in 2012.
“David Cameron cuts NHS spending by £500million.” (06/11/12)
Two years later and we have this headline from the Guardian:
“David Cameron accused of hypocrisy over £1.4bn ‘raid’ on NHS funding." (06/07/2012)
By 2014 NHS staff were on strike because of the Tory government refused to give them a 1% pay rise. Rows over poor pay and under-funding continue to this day.
While Jeremy Hunt was Health Secretary patient experience and staff moral took a dramatic turn for the worse. Despite presenting himself as a “champion of patient safety”, targets were missed, waiting times increased, and the very fabric of some hospitals began to crumble, leading to Hunt being labelled “the man who ruined the NHS”. (Open Democracy: 08/07/22)
In 2016 The Independent ran this headline:
“Jeremy Hunt co-authored book calling for NHS to be replaced with private insurance.” (10/02/2016)
Is it any wonder the NHS has been seriously under-funded and run down when the man in charge was an advocate of private medical health insurance? Millionaires like Cameron (£40m) Hunt (£15m) and Sunak (£651m) can afford to pay for expensive medical care but the rest of us are not so fortunate.
This brings me back to the purely selfish reason we should vote for the party most likely to protect the NHS. Below are some AVERAGE costs for private medical procedures and treatments in the USA provided by Statistica 2021
Heart valve replacement…….$170,000 £133,390
Heart bypass………………….......$123,000 £96,518
Cornea (per eye) ……………......$17,000 £13,339
IVF treatments ………………......$15,400 £12,084
Hysterectomy ………………….....$5200 £4,080
In addition, Americans have to pay for their stay in hospital. This fee is on top of medical treatment costs. According to Debt.org (30/11/23) the price for the average stay in hospital of 4.6 days is $13,262. (£10,406)
Whatever your political leanings, the protection and restoration of the NHS should take precedent over all other electoral considerations because we will ALL need medical treatment at some stage in our lives be that as a child or as an adult.
We know the Tory mantra "private sector good public sector bad” just doesn’t live up to reality: we only have to look at our polluted waterways to realise this. Whether Keir Starmer would be any better at protecting the NHS from profit motivated private companies is a moot point.
With headlines like:
“Can Wes Streeting’s private sector plans save the NHS?” (Guardian: 14/04/24)
and
“Labour’s Wes Streeting just used the SUN to talk up NHS privatisation” (Canary: 08/04/24)
we cannot rely on the Labour Party leadership to protect the NHS from the profiteering private sector, not least because Wes Streeting has been paid £175,000 from donors linked to private health firms. (National: 14/04/24) There is no such thing as a free lunch so one doesn’t have to wonder to hard what these “donors” might want in return for their money!
Even so, I feel there are those within the Labour Party who would work very hard to stop the leadership of the party from running down the NHS to the point of collapse, as is the Tory plan, so with great reservation I will be voting Labour in the coming elections.
Save Our NHS