Flu and Health Spending

As I posted last week, I have had a long term interest in this subject (flu) and am meeting with the Director of Public Health for London later today with a delegation from the Patients Forum. I will report back from that meeting in due course but I remain concerned about how the NHS is approaching the issue, or at least how mixed messages are being sent out. I also remain concerned about the nuts and bolts of distribution of drugs etc. The Green Party has issued the press release below.

On a related topic, I watched Newsnight last night where most of the programme dealt with the prospect of cuts in the NHS. http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00lxwdb/Newsnight_27_07_2009/

This is certainly what I am hearing from NHS managers and that the current service reconfiguration - polyclinics etc - is mainly driven by the need for a really slimmed down NHS after 2011. A number of options were presented on the programme, many of which I would find totally unacceptable. It is interesting that when the public is surveyed about the NHS, and this came out on Newsnight, that they are overwhelmingly opposed to cuts to the NHS frontline services but not to cuts at managerial level, where room for trimming is accepted. It is undoubtedly true that the Labour government has poured a lot of funding into the NHS but how much of that funding has been for the spectacularly disastrous PFI programme and for armies of consultants? This has left the door open for those arguing for cuts in the NHS and wholesale privatisation. It must also be admitted that only in the last few years has health spending in this country reached the EU average and it must be kept at that level.

Although the Tories are arguing that NHS spending will be ringfenced, they are also calling for an emergency budget immediately after the general election. And what will emerge from that? With an aging population it is essential that health spending is maintained. The real question is how health education can be improved so that the nation's health can be improved. A ban on fast food would be a start.

Put people ahead of GDP when managing swine flu

The Green Party is calling for Labour to put people ahead of GDP in their plans for managing swine flu.

Joseph Healy, the Green Party's parliamentary candidate for Vauxhall, and the deputy chair of the London Ambulance Service Patients Forum, said:

"In a meeting with the flu planners for London -- which the London Ambulance Service Patients Forum had over two years ago -- we were told that large scale public events would not be closed down because of the economic impact. The chair of the Forum, Malcolm Alexander, and I are due to meet Dr Simon Tanner, the Regional Director of Public Health for London, later today (the 28th of July), when I will be raising more of these issues."

Caroline Lucas, leader of the Green Party, said: "Leading experts are saying that school closures may stem the spread of the disease. If health experts tell us it is time to stop gathering in large crowds, we must heed their advice." (1)
Lucas continued: "If it means that sports fixtures are affected or business conferences don't go ahead, then so be it. The economy may well have to take a temporary hit to stop unnecessary deaths."

The Green Party also wants the government to ensure that people get clear and consistent messages about what they should and shouldn't do during the swine flu epidemic.
Lucas remarked: "The government, by issuing contradictory advice to pregnant women on staying away from crowds was at best unhelpful. If public information is still in a muddle and mess in the autumn, it could lead to many excess deaths."
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Notes to Editors:
(1) Dr Simon Cauchemez and Prof Neil Ferguson, both of Imperial College's department of infectious disease epidemiology, were quoted in the Lancet, August 2009, saying that a study of the 1918 flu outbreak in America and Australian cities indicated that shutting schools, in tandem with closing churches and improved hygiene, could have reduced the death toll by between 10% and 30% overall (and by as much as 50% in some cities at the height of the outbreak).