And the disruptive, distracting challenges of a major shift in funding and delivery models would make previous legislative reforms look like blips. Thousands of respondents to the survey and to regular Health Foundation and Ipsos polls cite access to care, waiting times, short staffing, and under-resourcing as key concerns. It’s the result of serially poor or ducked policy decisions on funding, capital investment, workforce planning, social care provision, and public health interventions. Right now, as a functional, universal public service, the NHS is failing. It may not quite be in end-of-life care, or about to have its financial or political life support removed, but without immediate action and longer term thinking it won’t see its 85th birthday.

Source: The Guardian June 28, 2023 11:46 UTC