In this week’s New Statesman special on the National Health Service, practitioners and health-care specialists describe the ways that Andrew Lansley’s reforms to the NHS in England — focused on reducing expenditure at all costs — will dismantle the public service and affect the quality of patient care.
Phil Whitaker, an NHS GP for more than 20 years, explains how the overhaul will leave doctors demoralised; chief economist at the King’s Fund, John Appleby, uncovers the full extent of the budget cuts and former health minister and surgeon, Lord Darzi, describes how the coalition’s reforms are wholly misplaced.
Elsewhere in the magazine, Labour health spokesman Andy Burnham — now shadowing a role he held in government — lays out his objections to Lansley’s NHS plans and explains what Labour would do differently, meanwhile Clare Gerada, chair of the Royal College of GPs tells Sophie Elmhirst how the reform (“so large you can see it from outer space”) will extend waiting lists and reduce patient choice.
All this, plus Mehdi Hasan on a nuclear Iran, Rafael Behr on Nick Clegg’s suicidal Europeanism, a new NS Food column by Felicity Cloake, Condoleezza Rice‘s discretion on Iraq, Sarah Churchwell in defence of Marilyn Monroe‘s artistic achievements, and a profile of War Horse author, Michael Morpurgo.
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