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NHS Deficit
February 8th, 2007 at 21:01
There’s one thing that I keep seeing that confuses me every time I see it. And I’m not talking about Noel Edmond’s career revival.
They’ve started branding ambulances and giving them a slogan. Seriously. On the side of a lot of ambulances I see, it says “responding to need” in fashionable lower case.
As much as I love branding, it does seem a little… pointless. It’s not as if there’s a rival easyAmbulance, who offer a cheaper no-frills service (there’s no defibrillator in the back) and will drop you off twenty miles outside of the hospital.
It just seems like a bit of a waste of money when there’s apparently a massive deficit in the NHS. There’s been all sorts of fuss over the NHS’s financial problems, and it baffles me, as there’s such an easy solution:
I think one way cutting costs would be to make Doctor’s pay performance linked. That way, doctors would be discouraged from doing a Shipman, and would cure more people, and would work harder, otherwise they get no income whatsoever. They’d also reduce the need for as many doctors as they’d treat more people. Of course, to be fair they’d have to weight the pay: a heart transplant could perhaps be worth four hernia operations- and multiple ailments on a patient gets bonus multipliers.
The NHS must have to source its drugs from the likes of GlaxoSmithKline. Because of drug patents, the drug companies are able to charge as much as they like and people will have to pay, otherwise they’ll die. Basically, drugs companies are bastards… so why not source the drugs from elsewhere? Every day I get hundreds, if not thousands of e-mails offering me “CHEAP MEDS”, or even “CHE@P MEDS!!!”- surely I’m not the only one? If the NHS bought their stuff online, they could make a massive saving, as my understanding is that the meds available on the internet are “cheap”.
If there’s a bed shortage, why not make any couples who are seeking treatment at the same time share a bed? It’s not like they’ll mind. Similarly, perhaps they should set up an NHS dating service? They could reduce the need for beds without having to build any new wards.
I think they take quite a few photos during operations too, for like, training purposes and researchers on Holby City… why don’t hospitals take the next logical step and try and sell photos back to patients in a cardboard frame at a massively inflated price, like you can buy after going on rides at places like Alton Towers?
If they’d just turn hospitals in to more of an entertainment experience in general, then people would be more willing to part with their cash. It wouldn’t even take much effort: charge an entrance fee to the “hilarious injuries” ward, and offer people the chance to have a go at “real life operation”- they could do it in the morgue, as the atmosphere is currently pretty dead in there, and the ‘patients’ are less likely to complain about being wired up with a buzzer in a cynical money-grabbing exercise.
Any political parties reading? Why not get me in to consult on your hospitals policy, like how David Cameron got Bob Geldof in to talk about poverty?
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