Legal Fees and Greedy Solicitors

The legal profession are at it again. Fees for solicitors in litigation with the NHS can be as much as £600 an hour. That money is being directly sucked out of patient care and represents one of the worst and least principled attacks on the Health Service I have ever heard of (and I lived through the reign of the evil witch of Grantham).

We simply have to move from a culture of litigation to a system of 'no blame' compensation for medical accidents. Doctors (no shrinking violets themselves when it comes to bleeding the NHS) could then possibly learn from the errors of others who would no longer have an interest in denial or cover up. Patients and relatives desperate for answers could be dealt with honestly and openly, and the greedy sods would just have to go and rob someone less vulnerable.

Rationing in the National Health Service

NHS doctors are apparently discussing rationing of treatments in the health service as a way of saving money (or making existing funding go further).

I don't really want to get overinvolved in the healthcare arguments, although it seems as if one of the richest countries in the World shouldn't be in a position where it has to let its old and its ill suffer and die because it is expensive to keep them alive with dignity.

The other thing that this discussion of rationing raises is the very real possibility of patients being divided into the deserving and the undeserving. As the country moves to the right, and it is becoming ever harder to stop that drift, we will hear more and more about treatments being withdrawn from those who have abused their bodies by their lifestyles.

I would not personally exclude the possibility, with the leaps in technology we are making, of some committee examining your supermarket loyalty card to see if you have been eating your 6 portions of fruit and veg. a day and avoiding unhealthy foods before authorising your operation.

Palmprint scanners in some primary and secondary schools are already recording what our children eat. I hope that their records don't come back to haunt them in later life.

We should be opposing compulsory ID cards, but just as invidious are the voluntary ones to which we sign up in increasing numbers. If we are asked for personal information we should be asking why, who will have access, and what happens to it when it is no longer needed .

Smoking and the N H S: An Ex-Smokers View

I see that NHS Highland are to ban smoking anywhere on their grounds. As a smoker for 40 years, who gave up only 2 years ago I would not oppose any measure which encourages people to quit, but some of the measures being put in place (not just in health boards but all over) only bring the non smoking lobby into ridicule. Perhaps 2 examples of the thing I am talking about which only make smokers dig in their heels and stubbornly refuse to stop.

First, I can personally vouch for the truth of the story that doctors and nurses at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley, which sits in its own grounds at the top of a hill, arrange to park a car near to the main doors, and at break time they all drive to the bus stop at the bottom of the hill outside the grounds for a smoke. This is stupid and pointless and only makes the smoking community harden their attitudes by forging a bond of perceived mutual hardship which acts as a support group encouraging smoking.

Second, there is a story I am told, but cannot vouch for personally, about the retail park at Govan, which even if it isn't true is an example of the sort of thing that happens when the nicotine fascists flex their muscles.
If it's true, smokers working in ASDA are not allowed to smoke in the ASDA car park and smokers working in Toys R Us next door are not allowed to smoke in theToys r Us car park. There is no fence between the car parks so Asda's car park is used as a smoking area by the staff from Toys r us and vice versa.