The state of the National Health Service is largely discussed in terms of waiting lists, availability of beds, epidemics here and there, public-spending cuts and the like.

Draw the veil from these broad issues and you are likely, as I did, to experience the most banal neglect leading to unbelievable human suffering. And then you get a huge cover-up led by educated professionals who are afraid to admit that they have had to sacrifice life to the internal market mechanism.

I wrote here more than three years ago about my friend BW, as I had called him from childhood, who was riddled with cancer for two and a half years but was not diagnosed with it until the last week of his life. He died on 26 September 1996. In my column that week, I pledged that I would continue until every single question was answered to the satisfaction of his wife, his relatives and his children. I have kept my word.

BW complained about pains in his stomach from the summer of 1994. He visited his GP in August 1994 and was referred to a hospital in south London in November. He was not seen until February and not given a bed until May 1995. He called me at home. "DH," he said, "I'm in hospital". "What's wrong?" I asked. He replied, "If I knew, I would not be here". I made my way to the hospital that day. Since childhood, he had never been ill. Seventeen stone, fleet of foot, sharp of mind, a huge Rastafarian with a warm personality which concealed the lion within him. He was quietly watching a football match on television, wincing in pain. He told me that he had cancer. He was sure, and would brook no intervention from me. I shed a tear as I fussed around him. As I left, I walked backwards, waving limply, tears rolling down my cheeks.

I kept in touch over the next 18 months or so. They treated him for ulcers. Then that went off the list. He was scanned and re-scanned and they told us nothing was wrong.

In July 1995, he was committed to a psychiatric ward in a south London hospital. He had lost four and a half stone and the consultant was certain that BW was starving himself in order to be a slim Rasta in line with the health movement.

The NHS was revealing itself as an organisation in rapid degeneration. It insisted that BW's problem was all in his mind. Yet even the psychiatric patients in the ward complained that he did not belong there. The hospital administrators raided his locker because they thought he was addicted to painkillers and had a stash hidden away.

The weight kept falling off; by the end, he was a mere seven and a half stone. In two and a half years, he was never seen by an oncologist (a cancer specialist). Not once.

He went into a psychiatric ward of another south London hospital in September 1995. He discharged himself after two days, his stomach now hugely distended. He was later operated on "to release the blockage". He was found to be riddled with cancer.

His wife Sue began the legal process of seeking damages for negligence. On the first scan there existed, for all to see, huge shadows around the pancreas. Match that with a great loss of weight, and it seems reasonable to pursue the suspicion of cancer. Yet no oncologist was summoned. My view is that the doctors knew early on that he had cancer but thought he would soon be a goner. So the NHS's internal market came into play and they decided that it was not worth the expense of a specialist and radio therapy.

But the burden of proof is onerous; you have to show that the medical profession acted unreasonably. We took advice from consultants, who insisted that their colleagues' actions were eminently reasonable.

We say the negligence began at the first scan. They admit only to six weeks before he died. We have fired our lawyers who have urged us to compromise. We seek honourable consultants, honourable legal advice. So, at the end of the day, Sue and I can call the kids together - Joanne, Trevor, Zagai, Sophie, Zaila and Makeda - and tell them that their dad did not die in vain.