Health
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No More NHS Privatisation!
A huge NHS privatisation deal has just been announced. £780 million more of taxpayers’ money will now go to private companies for services which used to be delivered by the NHS. Piece by piece, the NHS is being sold off to the highest bidder. But our NHS is precious and belongs to us all. We… Continue reading
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Save our NHS
Today, 38 Degrees members went out on the streets in Streatham. They added name after name to a petition telling all your local politicians to save the NHS. And it’s not just here – 38 Degrees members were out in hundreds of locations across the country. Continue reading
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The NHS: Unaccountable!
Could Jeremy Hunt’s NHS executives be wasting millions of pounds of our money? For weeks, NHS England – the people he put in charge of our NHS – have been promising to show how they are spending our money. They said they’d publish their receipts by 1st November, but we’re still waiting. Continue reading
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NHS Care.data soon to become active
Care.data – the scheme that would give our personal medical data to private companies. It’s being rolled out in just a few weeks’ time. But 92% of 38 Degrees members think we should get the scheme stopped until we can make sure our health data won’t end up in private hands. Continue reading
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Stop the government’s care.data sell-off
The government are planning to sneak through the plan that would allow private companies to buy our personal medical data. But together we could stop it. Continue reading
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medConfidential Bulletin 10 October 2014
Now the pathfinder areas have been announced, we are pushing to see exactly what patients (and GPs) will be told. In the meanwhile, if you do have concerns about care.data and if you haven’t done so already, our advice continues to be to opt out now. N.B. If you opted out of care.data earlier this… Continue reading
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UK Supermarkets Told to Wake Up to GMO
GeneWatch UK called on supermarkets Wednesday to wake up to the environmental harm caused by genetically modified (GM) animal feed, imported from North and South America. Blanket spraying of Monsanto’s RoundUp Ready GM crops with the weedkiller RoundUp has destroyed the habitat of the Monarch butterfly in the United States to such an extent that… Continue reading
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Make the NHS the issue of next year’s election
Now it’s time to focus on the other parties and make sure they also commit to increasing NHS funding. They’ll make their election promises in the next few days. So let’s show them that UK voters want the NHS to come first. Continue reading
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What we want from our NHS
With a sea of ‘I love the NHS’ t-shirts, we sent out a strong message that we love our health service too much to let it be sold off to the highest bidder. Last night, NHS bosses could clearly see which issues hit home, and more importantly which didn’t. When 38 Degrees members come together,… Continue reading
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Quiz the NHS Today!
It’s NHS England’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) and they’ll be making decisions about the future of our NHS. 38 Degrees members will be there to make sure NHS bosses are clear we want the NHS to be protected. But if you can’t attend, your voice can still be heard! Continue reading
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Last Chance to tell the NHS what you think
In one week’s time, NHS England – who run our NHS – are holding their biggest decision-making meeting of the year. The meeting’s open to anyone, so this is our chance to be heard by the people making huge changes to our NHS. Continue reading
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NHS protest camp and a new Jarrow march – whatever it takes to save our hospitals By Jos Bell
Public health is crumbling. This week hospitals have reported a 71% rise in patients admitted suffering from malnutrition since 2010, including a 31% rise in the yesteryear Vitamin C deficiency disease, scurvy. Echoes of Daniel Defoe and Proust in the 21st century. Late summer brings a surge of protest against plans to close down swathes… Continue reading
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My eye – the blurring of Foundation Trusts and private medicine By Diane Langford
Only when I was summoned to an appointment at a private hospital I’d never heard of, for a procedure I didn’t need, did I begin to question how NHS Foundation Trusts are obliged to raise money from private patients – and the pressures on them to set up private units through a complicated web of… Continue reading
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We all already own the NHS – the latest ‘mutual’ spin is about taking it out of our hands By Caroline Molloy
Here we go again. Turning the NHS into a ‘staff-owned’ mutual or ‘social enterprise’ has been re-launched more times than Liam Fox’s career, generally to a resounding wave of indifference or hostility from NHS staff who are generally less interested in being ‘social entrepreneurs’ than in getting on with doctoring and nursing. Continue reading
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Stop distracting us with the ‘health tourism’ sideshow By Kailash Chand
Hunt commissioned research from two firms, Prederi and Creative Research, to come up with the £500m a year figure – but the companies themselves admitted this research was “based on incomplete data, sometimes of varying quality, and a large number of assumptions”. Actual ‘deliberate’ health tourism was estimated by Prederi to cost between £20 and… Continue reading
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On TTIP and the NHS, they are trying to bamboozle us By John Hilary
The TTIP trade treaty talks re-open in Brussels this week. We should not be reassured by the convenient ‘leak’ of a private letter between key TTIP advocates claiming the treaty poses no threat to the NHS. Continue reading
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Take our ‘treatment’ or we’ll stop your benefits, Tories threaten mentally ill By Louise McCudden
Proposals to strip benefits from depressed people who ‘refuse’ treatment are unethical, ignore root causes, and are likely to force people into inappropriate treatment or penury. Continue reading
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“Save our Surgeries” call goes out on NHS birthday By Doctor Ron Singer
As the NHS turned 66 on Saturday, patients and health workers marched through the streets of East London in protest at the threatened closure of scores of GP surgeries. Continue reading
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Destroying the NHS: Time to get even with Stevens By John Lister
New NHS boss Simon Stevens has revealed his true privatising colours with this week’s announcement on personal health budgets – which would wreck NHS services and leave the field clear for big business. We have been waiting to see whether – and how – new NHS boss Simon Stevens would work round to furthering the… Continue reading
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“Handing patients NHS cash” is just rebranding cuts By Peter Beresford
Personal health budgets are to be rolled out to many more patients and combined with social care personal budgets, Simon Stevens, NHS England’s new Chief Executive announced yesterday. But as spending on both social care and the NHS contracts, what is the evidence underpinning this massive shift in resources? Continue reading