YOU'VE BEEN WARNED: BRITAIN CAN'T AFFORD A WELFARE STATE

At least, not for the likes of you

According to a report in the Independent (thanks to James Morton for the headsup), new drugs will only be made available on the NHS  in England, if they help people deemed to be a benefit to society under proposals that prompted fears elderly people could be denied treatment.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice: the English organisation charged with deciding which drugs are affordable) is due to change how it decides which drugs can be provided by the health service.

The proposals would mean Nice would have to consider “wider societal benefits” of the treatments as well as the cost and benefits to patients.

Dr Paul Catchpole, of the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry, told The Daily Telegraph: “It is concerning because, under the new appraisal system, cancer medicine might do less well because older people aren't as beneficial to society.

"You might have a cancer treatment for a severe disease but because the majority of the cancer patients are elderly they aren't generating wider societal benefits, they are more likely to be generating costs.

“But if you have got a medicine that gets someone back to work then you could argue, under this system, that that's better for society.”

David Taylor, professor of pharmaceutical and public health policy at University College London, said the plan was “a real threat to the public well-being and a real threat to the well-being of older people”.

“To me the whole methodology seems deeply suspect,” he said.

Sources close to English Health Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, told The Telegraph that plan was at an early stage and would not result in discrimination against elderly people (so you can guarantee that it will).

The draft policy is due to be put out for public consultation in the next few weeks.

First they denigrate the sick and the unemployed with the eager help of their friends at the Daily Mail, Express, Star and Sun, then they start killing them off by denying them benefits. Now it’s the turn of the old. If you aren’t of benefit to Cameron’s society, you should die and not cost anything to decent hardworking families up and down the country.

Who’s next on their hit list?

People who don't vote Tory?

I warn you. If we vote NO there's no way Scotland will avoid this. So vote no, and commit suicide at 45, because getting old is not going to be fun.

BTW, I seem to remember that Johann Lamont made a big fuss about how you could get one cancer drug in England that was unavailable in Scotland. (She failed to mention that there were examples of the exact opposite).

I wonder how she feels about this. After all, she's not getting any younger.
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I too was disgusted to see this on a Facebook page. From what I can see the DWP has decided that this guy's girlfriend contributed to her own cancer, and is therefore not entitled to any enhanced payment.

So, does this mean that anyone who has smoked, or drunk, or eaten more than they have exercised, and whose medical condition could at least in part, be blamed upon these activities... is no longer entitled to enhanced payments.

Will this include people who have been injured whilst driving (after all they could have taken the bus); have had sports injuries (they could have stayed on the settee); war injuries (they weren't called up to the forces, they chose to join)?

This is our so-called united kingdom.

But you shouldn't be surprised; remember a few weeks ago osborne told you all quite clearly that we could no longer afford a welfare state. You seriously cannot say that you were not warned.

A "DEAR JOHANN" LETTER

Dear Ms Lamont,

In May you protested at First Minister's Questions about the lack of funding for some cancer treatments in Scotland (a Scotland that is dependent for its spending money on a Tory government, which it didn't elect, you may recall).

You even, to prove your point, lest the First Minister thought you were making it up (and let's be honest, in health matters, among others, your party has form... [I'm talking about you Jackie]), brought along a woman who was suffering from cancer and who had been denied a drug that might have extended her life...a drug she would be able to access in England. She was, you said, obliged to move to England to get the treatment.

This seemed, if I may allowed to say so, to be a cheap trick on your part.

It was  pointed out to you at that time that, wherever you go, in whatever country in Europe, there are treatments you can get one place and not another. 

In this case a drug that had not been approved for use in Scotland was available in England, and you gave the impression that you felt that that was the norm by saying that Scotland was in danger of "exporting health refugees", as if England was the place where, regardless of cost, second to none treatment was available..  

There are differences across Europe. A drug available free of charge in Italy might not be available in Spain. A treatment regularly used in Malta might not be available in Bulgaria. 

Quite simply each country has its own organisation which decides which drugs are considered a good use of the limited amount of money that most countries can afford to spend on them. 

I've thought a lot about you in the last few weeks when all these stories of unbelievably appalling standards of care have been highlighted in the English National Health system, involving thousands of needless deaths attributable to corner cutting and downright neglect of patients. 

You were on my mind too when I read in the Metro the other day a story about a young lad of 8, who had been promised an operation to help him to walk. 

Just as little Joseph Hill, from Leeds, was preparing himself for this operation which would allow him to lead a more normal life, his parents got a letter saying that due to reorganisation, the operation was no longer available on the national health. Instead his family would have to find £20,000 to pay for it. An unbelievably cruel thing to do to an 8 year old who only wants to be able to walk, would you not say?

In the meantime, in a matter a little closer to your original complaint against the Scottish government, NICE has decided that "pertuzumab" will not be available to patients in England. The drug which can extend life in some breast cancer patients when used in conjunction with other chemo, is not, according to NICE, cost effective.

You might also note that Mr Hunt has been obliged to find emergency funding of £500,000,000 to prop up disastrous A & E services in England as his privatised 111 call centres fall apart in front of his eyes, and we discover that patients are being left to the tender mercies of laymen with 5 weeks' call centre training to diagnose and advise treatment.

The Scottish Health Service leaves a good deal to be desired, but there I feel that, given the parlous state of NHS England, it is more likely that health refugees will be coming to Scotland rather than leaving it.

I trust you are enjoying our extended break. It seems so long since we saw the leader of her majesty's Scottish opposition. 

I look forward to your return to the front line.

Yours sincerely


Tris