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Monday, 9 December 2019

Health Issues and Politics. The General Election in Britain (2). 2019.

              " I predict, (in advance) that these (and other) false assumptions will underlie the basis of the political debate to come, and that the inevitable result will be that Britain decides to spend still more money on a medical system whose failure is spiraling out of control."

I predicted this back in August - that political parties would seek to outbid each other on how much additional money they could spend on the NHS. And this is what has happened! It was an easy prediction based on one of these false assumptions - "that health is good: therefore spending more money on health is good".
  • At the moment (2019-2020) the UK spends £121 billion on the NHS.
  • The Conservative party has plans to increase this to £149 billion.
  • The Liberal Democrats have pledged to spend £154 billion.
  • And Labour is committed to spend £155 billion.
It remains to be seen who will win the election, but two things have already been made clear
  • there is no longer a political debate about how much more money to spend on the NHS, and conventional medicine: the politics now is about each party seeking to outbid each other in their plans and expenditure promises
  • despite the mainstream media castigating the Labour party for its spending promises - the huge increases being promised are not sufficient to meet the needs of the NHS. The NHS, now totally dominated and controlled by pharmaceutical medicine, has announced that these increases are not enough. The NHS needs even more.
NHS Providers has accused politicians of not offering 'credible answers' to the NHS's biggest challenges, of ducking the big issues in health and social care during the election. Its head, Chris Hopson, writing in the Times, has urged all political parties not to make 'empty promises' or create 'unrealistic expectations.

The parties have also made promises to increase staffing. Labour, for instance, has pledged to boost nurse numbers by 24,000, the Conservatives by 50,000.The Liberal Democrats have promised to put one penny on income tax to help fund health and social care.

But despite this Hopson said the election debate had 'fallen short' - presumably of his hopes and expectations. Politicians have just not listened to him.

What this does is to give notice to all political parties that spending money on an NHS dominated and controlled by pharmaceutical medicine is always going to fall short. The NHS, as currently constituted, is a bottomless pit. It does not matter how much money is thrown into it - it will still demand more.

So why is this? And why has this 'why?' question never been asked - by politicians, or the media?

This is what happens when you continue to increase spending, exponentially
- on a failed medical system.  

Pharmaceutical medicine is not making sick patients better, so the demand for health care never gets less. And drug and vaccine 'side effects' cause epidemic levels of chronic disease which then have to be treated. And they are treated by a medical system that does not work. Then, patients damaged by these drugs and vaccines have to be looked after.

So I am not critical of politicians who believe it is a good idea to spend more on health. But I do blame politicians for failing to ask appropriate questions.

Why is it that, no matter how much money is ploughed into the NHS, it is never enough?

The problem with the NHS is not decades of under-investment, or an ageing population. It is that investment is being made into a medical system, pharmaceutical medicine, that does not work, that has never worked, and will never work.