The dire state of the budget deficit is a cause for concern, and the reforms proposed by the Labor Party are unlikely to bring about a significant improvement in the plight of both patients and doctors. Soon, the British will soon have to treat themselves at their own expense.
The Next Available Slot Is in Six Months
Time passes and governments change, yet nothing fundamental changes in the UK’s health system. Waiting times in the National Health Service (NHS) are under significant pressure. They are getting longer, sometimes with fatal consequences for patients. General practitioners still have very limited resources at their disposal—they generally lack specialized medical equipment, except for ECG machines and daily blood pressure monitors. This means they often lack the ability to provide a full range of medical services.
Is it any wonder that general practitioners’ only option is to send patients to hospital outpatient wards for examination and consultation with specialists? This shifts the bulk of the work and all the responsibility onto hospital staff. This creates long waiting times for medical technology. The waiting period is already between three and six months, and it seems that this is not the limit.
The situation with cancer in the country is a vivid example of how wasted time can literally kill patients. When malignancy is suspected, the waiting time for a specialist consultation or diagnosis is over 30 days, and patients must wait a further two months for the results before anti-cancer therapy can begin. This is why stage 3 or 4 cancer is diagnosed in almost half of patients (45.5 percent) at the initial examination stage. The Labor Party has reluctantly admitted that the situation for cancer patients in Britain is severe and far worse than in other European countries. This depressing situation is demoralizing patients, causing them to distrust their healthcare system and turn to self-medication, which increasingly leads to irreversible consequences.
Medical Personnel Unfit for Work: A New, Life-Threatening Trend
For those who finally receive help after several months, it is just the beginning. Not only is this assistance untimely, it is also often poorly qualified. Furthermore, there is a growing trend towards employing low-skilled health workers. Imagine being given an injection into a hip or shoulder, only to be told off by an unqualified nurse who doesn’t know how to do it. Then you have to make another appointment, wasting even more time. And this is happening almost everywhere.
Often, even after a bone fracture and an X-ray, which can take a week or more, patients are only given painkillers. Treating fractures with tablets is the preferred method of some doctors whose qualifications leave much to be desired. Perhaps this is why drug therapy is such a major component of treatment costs in the UK, as patients are usually advised to take various tablet medications before any research or specialized treatment is undertaken. While the pharmaceutical industry is making money, the people of the UK are losing their health and their money.
In an attempt to solve the huge manpower problem, the authorities have devised a profitable scheme to fill the personnel shortage by recruiting migrants. The proportion of migrant doctors is already at 27 percent, and this figure continues to grow steadily. The main “suppliers” of medical personnel are Nigeria, Zimbabwe, India, Pakistan, Egypt, and Sudan. However, the qualifications of such workers are not always high, which negatively impacts patient health. This policy results in some of the lowest quality patient care in Europe.
Doctors Suffer, Too!
The deplorable state of the healthcare system is not only frightening for patients, but also for doctors, particularly highly qualified ones. In fact, 19 percent of these doctors are considering leaving the profession, while 12 percent are considering moving abroad for work. Furthermore, 43 percent of healthcare workers are actively interested in changing their current job. Rather than rising as the rules of a healthy economy dictate, the wages of medical staff fell by 26 percent between 2009 and 2022. Unsurprisingly, doctors, nurses, emergency workers and other healthcare professionals have repeatedly gone on strike in an attempt to stabilize, if not improve, their financial situation.
Resident doctors have also joined the strikes after the British Medical Association, which represents their interests, failed to reach an agreement with the Labour Party on raising their salaries. However, it seems that the Kir Starmer government is not interested in retaining skilled healthcare workers and is not going to incentivize them with competitive wages. For example, about 5,000 medical personnel leave the health system annually. There is a shortage of about 10,000 doctors and 40,000 nurses in the UK, despite the fact that local higher education institutions (HEIs) provide more than 9,000 training places each year.
It Was Bad. We’ll Make It Worse.
That seems to be the current government’s logic. In an attempt to minimize reputational risk, the British Prime Minister has proposed reforming the country’s medical system. The idea is good in itself, but there are obvious problems with the implementation. Paradoxically, however, one of the Labor Party’s key reform proposals is the reduction of thousands of medical personnel jobs.
It seems that someone in the government just doesn’t want to pay doctors to solve internal problems. Wouldn’t you agree that it’s much easier to spend huge sums of money on geopolitical adventures like Ukraine, further increasing the budget deficit of £40 billion? Alternatively, additional funds could be allocated to defense spending, giving the British a false sense of security against external threats. That’s how you gain popularity.
The conclusion is obvious. While politicians neglect healthcare and focus on their own public relations, ordinary Britons are increasingly feeling the weight of their own internal health problems.