[Margaret Pilkington]

I left the NHS some 8 years ago.......front line staff were pared to the bone then.....and from the reports of my 'still working' friends, it has become much worse......nurses crying on their way in to work because they cannot hope to deliver the standard of care that they would wish for their own family.

This was not just the result of the last government, but of successive governments tinkering with something that they knew very little about.....bringing in market forces, as if patients lives were of less consequence than a tin of beans in Tesco.

I am dismayed at the thoughts of GPs commissioning services....that isn't what they are trained to do....it isn't their remit.
And as for the red herring of giving patients more choice about where to have treatment........that is pure baloney. Most patients want to be treated in their own locality, at a safe hospital, where their friends and family can visit.

Medicine is a money hungry beast, with many treatments(especially those for cancer) costing thousands of pounds.

The government is campaigning for people to identify cancer symptoms earlier to get the targets for treatment, up to those of other EU countries(whom, we lag depressingly behind)....and yet if you come forward and are diagnosed, then it is a good chance that NICE will refuse you the drug that could prolong your life.

Mixed messages or what?

My advice would be to get rid of the pen pushers, the tiers of administration...employ more nurses and midwives, ditch the PFI...if yopu can't afford to build hospitals then you must renovate the ones you have or ask for public subscription(many hospitals were built purely on public donations.....stop doing the unecessary stuff......IVF, cosmetic surgery....if people want these things then let them save up and pay for it in an NHS hospital......I could go on and on.