Is the NHS being privatised?

A five minute cartoon from the Green Party about the privatisation of the NHS. In 1948 the NHS was founded – one of the post-war generation’s greatest achievements. But will it be around in another 6 years, let alone another 66? The business-as-usual brigade – the Tories, Labour and the Lib Dems – have been breaking up the NHS by stealth, privatising it bit by bit, since 1990. UKIP say they’d accelerate this process. Only the Green Party believes in the publicly-owned, publicly-run NHS that the vast majority of the public say they want....

Let them eat cake

Air pollution in the UK has been bad enough that people in London were advised not to cycle. The government are keen to crack on with fracking – which will not improve air quality and is likely to poison our water. Climate change threatens our food supplies and collective long term health.

The dominant health story in the news this week has been eating 7 portions of fruit and veg a week, and cutting sugar intake to stay healthy. The week before that, we were talking about obesity. We get plenty of public information about smoking, alcohol consumption and exercise, as well. What these stories do, without exception, is to put the responsibility for health squarely on the shoulders of the individual.

We aren’t talking about the 38% of sick leave from work being caused by work stress. It was in the chief medical officer’s report, but didn’t make the news. We aren’t really talking about the implications of air pollution even though we know it’s a killer. We know that water pollution nearly rendered otters extinct in the UK – being predators at the top of a food chain, they are where the toxins collect. We don’t talk about what those pollutants in our rivers might have been doing to the human population in the same time frame.

Health and the environment are not different issues. What we eat, drink and breathe impacts on our bodies. What is in our clothes, in our buildings, in the plastic bottles we drink from? What’s in our soil?

If you care about your health, then you need more than the efforts you can make on your own behalf. You need political action to safeguard your food and water, and to tackle the smog. There’s not much point giving up cake if a sick work culture is undermining your mental health. An extra portion of fruit and veg might not be so good if the TTIP forces genetically modified plants on us.

There is nothing more precious than health. Our personal health, and the health of our eco-systems are one and the same. If we poison our air, then we poison ourselves. If you care about your health, you need to vote Green. We can have a better future.

Health of the nation

Recently, chief medical officer Dame Sally Davies has drawn attention to both rising obesity rates in adults and children, coupled with decreasing awareness in individuals of weight problems. More on details are on the BBC website http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-26765078 which is typical of how the report has been discussed in the media.

The actual report is here - https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/298297/cmo-report-2012.pdf and a lot of important points in it seem to have been ignored in favour of the obesity story.

Obeisty wasn’t the only issue Sally Davies comments on “A substantial portion of the burden of sickness absence is attributable to mental health” she notes ‘stress’ as a big issue. “38% of work-related illness is due to work-related mental health problems.” She says “the health status of the prison population is such that it has been suggested that, on average, prisoners aged over 50 have the same health status as those who are 10 years older in the general population.”

Unlike media responses, the original report is clear that “Increasingly sedentary lifestyles also play a part in the obesity picture.” “Adults watched an average of 1,648 minutes (27.5 hours) of television per week in 2013.” And, very importantly, she says, “Obesity is a complex multi-factorial problem which is not completely understood.” She does highlight the need for public education around sugar consumption.

We’ve taken food skills and cookery out of schools, and there’s nothing like the educational opportunities there could be around learning good nutrition, growing food, and learning to make our own food. Consequently we eat things out of packets with no real understanding of what we’re consuming, which makes it harder to manage a healthy balance. Without nutrition education, any other intervention is meaningless.

“People living in more deprived areas are, on average, disproportionately more exposed to avoidable risk factors for cancer.” We really need to be taking that onboard. “cigarette smoking, obesity, poor diet, and excessive alcohol consumption all are all significant risk factors for cancer, and are all more common in deprived areas”. We need to look at underlying factors here – education, resources, and poverty of opportunity all play a role. Again, the sedentary lifestyle dominated by screen-based entertainment is not helping.

There is a wider debate here which needs to happen, and isn’t. None of these health issues exist in a vacuum. Poverty diets can readily cause obesity with cheap carb and sugar based food being far more affordable than fresh fruit and vegetables. We need to be talking about access to affordable leisure and exercise opportunities, access to outdoor spaces being a critical part of this for those on low incomes who could never afford a gym membership. Mental health is also improved by access to green spaces. Stress is known to be alleviated through physical activity as well. We need to be talking about how current work culture is making people ill.

There is a known relationship between sleep deprivation and weight gain. http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/sleep/ Our noise polluted, stressful living environments, and the pressure to work long hours coupled with a lack of exercise makes for poor sleep, which in turn does not improve mental health. Visit a doctor when stressed and you’ll be told to get more exercise, more rest and more sleep (at least, that was my experience!).

There is a relationship between sedentary lifestyle and lack of exercise – two sides of the same issue that are not being properly connected in discussions. We should be talking about car and commuter culture, about our increasing dependence on screen-based entertainment, our depleted social interactions, our lack of safe access to green spaces. We should be talking about the work-life imbalance that leaves people sick with stress but also too tired to get out and about. We should be talking about real food, and knowing how to source and prepare it. Issues of poor mental health, and obesity are connected within our culture, and the same issues underpin both. Until we start tackling those core issues, by creating a healthier and more sustainable society, we’ll be left with the empty noise, empty calorie solution of a ‘sugar tax’ and nothing at all will change.

‘I Will Tell You Something of My Own’: art tackling stigma around dementia

Click poster to enlarge

Philip Booth writes: We would welcome readers helping to promote this exhibition about dementia...

You can meet two of the organisers in this short film on Stroud Community TV: http://stroudcommunity.tv/i-will-tell/

‘I Will Tell You Something of My Own’ is an artistic and scholarly exploration into dementia, which aims to combat the perception of dementia as a ‘living death’ or ‘slow unravelling of the self’.  The highpoint of this is an exhibition, using poetry, photography, song, stories and objects to portray a more positive view of people with dementia, exploring their everyday lives, selves and art.  The exhibition will be housed in Lansdown Hall Gallery in the centre of Stroud which is a fully accessible venue. We will be open Monday-Saturday 10.30-18.30 from 3rd December 2013 – 22nd December 2013 and 2nd January 2014 – 18th January 2014, with free entry for everyone.

In addition to the core collection of artworks, the exhibition has an interactive element.  Visitors with experience of dementia are able to contribute to this by loaning objects to the exhibition for a central collaborative display and/or photographs for a collaborative photo album.  Photographs can also be contributed in advance by e-mailing hgregory@glos.ac.uk or writing to Dr Helen Gregory, University of Gloucestershire, Francis Close Hall Campus, Swindon Road, Cheltenham, G50 4AZ.  Please include a short caption with your photograph.

You can find out more about the project at: <http://www.tinyurl.com/somethingofmyown>

'I Will Tell You Something of My Own' is funded by Arts Council England/the National Lottery and Gloucestershire NHS, and is supported by Age UK Gloucestershire.

Greens and the NHS

If you were wondering what the Green relationship with the NHS looks like, this will give you a fair idea.

Last year, the eminent obstetrician Wendy Savage, spoke at a "Stroud Against The Cuts" meeting in support of "Keep Our NHS Public".

At the 'Brighton People's Assembly Undercover' event on Sept 6th, she said this about the Green Party in her speech: "The only party supporting the NHS is the Green Party and they have the best health policy."

101 out of 166 hospital trusts which responded to a BBC 5 live Freedom of Information request had 1,260 vacant A&E posts, leaving them understaffed on average by nearly 10%.

Jennie Fecitt, lead nurse of campaign group Patients First, and an A&E nurse for 25 years, said this level of vacancies would have a "significant impact" on the safety and wellbeing of patients.

As with so many cuts, Labour make no commitment to reversing those imposed on the Health Service.

Health and the NHS - Green Party Policy Summary

The Green Party believes that compassion and illness prevention must underpin our healthcare system. Through supporting healthier eating, exercise and access to nature and by reducing pollution and social inequalities, a Green government will support mental wellbeing while minimising healthcare needs and costs. We will maintain a publicly funded, publicly provided and decentralised health service, while abolishing prescription charges and reintroducing free eye tests and NHS dental treatment for all. We will implement the Scottish system of free social care for elderly people.'