Friday, October 21, 2011

Altruism & Calamity: Private failure & Public rescue.

What is Altruism: 


Man is drowning. A banker watching took out two £50 note and threw it to the drowning man’s wife: “Get him some private swimming lessons!”

There was a public life-guard, he jumped in and pull the man out and saved him.

The wife tried to give him the £100. He refused: “All part of the public service.”




NHS Altruism

I give you Choice and Personalised Health Budget, what else do you want!


Calamity: remember Southern Cross?

The Life-Guard: Clare Gerada



The best views are free and the best things in life are often free.




©Am Ang Zhang 2011




A reprint:

Imagine a society where you take your beloved car to a Private Garage for some repair work and it turns out that the Private Garage did a very bad job and did serious damage to the engine, transmission and other unknown bits. Now imagine that there is a State run National Car Service that will put right everything and at no cost to you and no charge to the Private Garage that did the damage in the first place.


Would it not be wonderful?

In health care, you already have that right now and it is called the National Health Service. It is free even if the damage was done by a private doctor and treatment will be for as long as it takes. The private doctor will not be charged any fee and some even continues to practice here or in other countries.

Soon, such a National Car Health Service may not be there!

The Guardian
David Cameron
 is to "completely change" public services, bringing in a "presumption" that private companies, voluntary groups or charities are as able to run schools, hospitals and many other council services as the state.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph about the plans…………..the prime minister says he is seeking to end the "state's monopoly" over public services, with only the security forces and judiciary exempt.

It was one of my Coackroach News Catches over the last week-end and it concerns the mother of Rheagan Hendry; wife of former Scotland captain Colin Hendry Denise. She died from a brain infection following a long battle with illness after a liposuction procedure went wrong. Rheagan wrote in:




In 2002, Denise checked into a private clinic for what should have been a straightforward procedure to remove fat from her stomach. Afterwards she spent six weeks in intensive care (in NHS hospital), the surgeon having repeatedly punctured her bowel.

In the next seven years (again under the NHS) she endured more than 20 operations to repair the damage before succumbing to meningitis in 2009. She was 43.                             
                                                                                                  
Herald Scotland Rheagan Hendry
Read all about it here>>>>

The surgery was performed by Dr Gustaf Aniansson (from Sweden), at the private Broughton Park Hospital near Preston, Lancashire. Dr Gustaf Aniansson took himself off the GMC register so that he could not be struck off and it was believed he continues to practice in Sweden.

In the new world order of our NHS, private provider (AQW)for commercial reasons need not let the public have access to information about their activities etc, and even the doctors they provide. As they say, be very afraid.

Another case happened a little while back and again it was a private cosmetic operation that went wrong and the NHS tried to look after the patient for over six months.   Read all about it here>>>>



Even as we like our NHS as much as our woods: looks like private providers for public services is in the PM's mind. Sometimes it is public (taxpayer) money for private failures: catastrophic failures when it is someone's life.



The NHS is totemic. It is about a pool of altruism and it speaks to who we are as a nation. It is the mortar that binds us in the way that the American constitution does the American people. For us, it is about this system. It really is the place where we are "all in it together"-one of the few places, it would seem at the moment. Doctors get 88 per cent trust ratings with the public, while politicians get 14 per cent. The vast majority of doctors are saying to us, "Withdraw this Bill". We should be listening.

                                                                                    Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws 




                                                                                                           
Clive Peedell: NHS Privatisation

3 comments:

Jenny Woolf said...

I have a relative in West Berks community hospital and they say it is better than any private hospital they have been in. I do wish NHS could figure out a way of getting enough physio, perhaps they should make people pay for it who can afford it and so they have money for the people who cannot afford it.

By the way I think you've got something wrong in your story about the banker, would he really give a stranger £100???

Cockroach Catcher said...

The Banker did not want to get wet and £100 was less than the tip for the Sommelier when he drinks his Ch. Latour!!!

Added extra bits to illustrate!!!

Thanks.

Ms Fisher said...

Such a great post about elk grove cockroaches. Keep on posting!