Celebrations marking the 75th anniversary of the founding of Britain's NHS on July 5, 1948, were marred by warnings that government policies, or the lack thereof, posed an existential threat to the conception-to-grave service which is free to all at the point of use. File photo by Adam Vaughan/EPA-EFE
July 5 (UPI) -- Britain's NHS, which turned 75 years old Wednesday, may not make it to 100 due to years of "quick fixes" by politicians in place of proper policies and investment to fix everything from bed shortages to social care, top health charities and think tanks have warned.
The chief executives of the Health Foundation, Nuffield Trust and The King's Fund issued the stark warning that continued "short-termism" to address complex and long-standing issues would lead to managed decline, undermining the NHS' very purpose.
In a joint letter to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and the leaders of the Labor and Liberal Democrat parties, the groups urged them to make next year's general election a turning point by ending the quick-fix approach to policymaking in favor of a long-term plan to address the underlying causes of the current crisis.
"75 years after its creation, the National Health Service is in critical condition. Pressures on services are extreme and public satisfaction is at its lowest since it first began to be tracked 40 years ago," the letter reads.
It noted, however, that the service "still tops surveys about what makes people most proud to be British" with particular support for its founding principals that it remain "free at the point of use, comprehensive and available to all."
"For the public, the NHS remains the jewel in the country's crown, even if it is losing it's shine," the think tank chiefs wrote. "The next government will face a choice between providing the investment and reform needed to preserve the NHS for future generations or continuing with short-termism and managed decline that gradually erodes the guarantee of safety in place of fear it was designed to create."
While recovery and reducing waiting times for treatment following COVID-19 are rightly a key priority, the groups warn that a strategy that promises unachievable, unrealistically fast improvements is "doomed to failure."
The think tanks are pushing for any plan to comprise four key elements: Investment in beds and buildings to add capacity and new technology; reform social care for the elderly to free up hospital bed spaces; cross-party commitment to improve underlying social economic factors affecting public health; and building on the NHS' new workforce plan by providing the funding it needs to succeed.
The head of NHS England, Amanda Pritchard kicked off a day of celebrations at London's Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, her old hospital, hailing the way the service has evolved and thanking the 1.2 million people working in it.
"Since day one, the NHS has never stood still. It has continually innovated and adapted to meet the changing needs of our patients -- and continues to do so. To everyone who's made such a difference to many millions of lives over the last 75 years -- thank you," Pritchard said in a Twitter post.
But Pritchard added her voice to the warnings over the NHS' future amid a wave of industrial action by doctors, consultants and radiographers that is gripping the service saying patients would pay the price for the failure of the government and unions to resolve the disputes ahead of seven strike days this month.
