This is the biggest attack on the NHS you've never heard of.
For the last few years the news has been full of winter and summer crisis in the NHS, with A&E's closing their doors and ambulances unable to discharge their patients.(1) In late 2015 the Chief Executive of NHS England, Simon Stevens, created a plan to solve this by CLOSING more A&Es. He thinks if you close hospitals people will stop using them. (2)
Called Sustainability and Transformation Plans he has split England into 44 areas - called 'footprints'. Each 'footprint' was told in late December in 2015 that they must have a plan by 30th June 2016 to completely change the way the NHS works. To work they had to be able to prove they could clear their massive debts within a year.
To do that they have to close services and sell land and hospitals.
Has a hospital closed near you? Is it under threat? Simon Stevens says that to make the NHS affordable we, the public, must get used to no longer having a major hospital within easy reach. This was planned in 2013, but shelved until after the 2015 election as being 'politically sensitive'. It looks like the STP has taken that off the shelf and that is very bad news. In 2013 there were 140 full A&E hospitals in England. We could be be left with between 40-70 A&Es. Closing A&Es is very bad for your health. (3)
There was a link to TTIP.
Jeremy Hunt hired Simon Stevens to take over NHS England in 2014. Before that he was President of global operations for United Health of America where he was a lobbyist for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. He didn't oppose it. He fought to open up public health services like our NHS to US private health corporations. We know TTIP and the NHS are top campaigns for 38 degrees members. (4)
Now he's in charge of our NHS! He is driving through a change which will eradicate our NHS and replace it with a US style health service. These new organisations could even be run by US corporations, holding the budgets and deciding what care will be provide and who can get it. This is what the Sustainability and Transformation Plans are doing to our NHS. See blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2016/08/05 and Updates, below.
TOGETHER WE CAN MAKE THIS A MILLION SIGNATURES FOR THE NHS!
We think this is the last big battle to save our NHS. If you want it to be there for your children and grandchildren in their time of need then fight now. (6)
BECAUSE WHEN IT’S GONE, IT’S GONE
https://youtu.be/0HyL-riKqqc
(1)
http://www.itv.com/news/anglia/update/2015-01-07/hospital-alerts-whats-the-state-of-your-local-hospital/
(2)
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/simon-stevens-nhs-will-be-unaffordable-without-radical-reforms-10099433.html
(3)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2200339/NHS-Cuts--Savage-consequences-revealed-pensioner-waits-6-hours-ambulance.html
(4)
http://healthcare-competitiveness.com/wp-content/uploads/Medtronic-UnitedHealth-Group-want-to-export-U.S.-health-care.pdf
(5)
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2007/nov/11/uk.publicservices
(6)
https://youtu.be/GHkzmCL-uNE
Also:-
https://opendemocracy.net/ournhs/deborah-harrington-madeleine-dickens-and-caroline-molloy/hunt-and-stevens-leaving-their-dirty
Another dreadful week for Jeremy Hunt:
https://opendemocracy.net/ournhs/caroline-molloy/you-don-t-have-to-be-brain-surgeon-to-know-hunt-is-wrong-this-week-everyone-d
I've also grouped them together on a page here:
http://bit.ly/NHSfootprints
Find out which 'Footprint' you are in by scrolling down to the map here:-
https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/stp-footprints-march-2016.pdf
http://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2016/08/05/tory-plans-for-nhs-privatisation-released-during-parliamentary-recess/
