NHS Newspeak

Cranmer has an interesting - and rather infuriating - post up about the production of a pamphlet for NHS staff, entitled "Good LGBT Practice in the NHS":

Among other things, the booklet instructs:

All staff should participate in awareness raising sessions so that they are fully aware of appropriate and inappropriate language…

And what constitutes this appallingly homophobic and offensive language?

Using the terms ‘husband’, ‘wife’ and ‘marriage’ assumes opposite sex relationships only and will automatically exclude all LGB people. Using the term ‘partner’ and ‘they/them’ to refer to the partner will avoid this problem. This is also inclusive of all heterosexual couples, regardless of their marital status…When talking to children, consider using ‘parents’, ‘carers’ or ‘guardians’ rather than ‘mother’ or ‘father’.

What an excellent use of taxpayers' money the publication of this pamphlet is. Not to mention, the cost of providing "awareness raising sessions" to teach NHS staff not to use such offensive and (thankfully) rarely-used terms as 'husband' and 'wife'. Of course, some antediluvian individuals might argue that it would be better to spend taxpayers' money on medical treatment for the sick, or return it to the taxpayer. But only bigoted homophobes could possibly share in that sentiment.

Lib Dems in good idea shocker!

Patients needing emergency NHS treatment after becoming drunk or incapacitated by drugs would be charged under proposals yesterday from Norman Lamb, the Liberal Democrat health spokesman.

The plan is one of a series of policy shifts in a strategy paper he published before the party's annual conference in Brighton next week. Mr Lamb said: "If you get rat-arsed on a Friday night and get taken to A&E where you are foul and abusive to staff, is it right for the taxpayers to fund your life-saving treatment?"

He called for wide public debate on whether the community should pay for the excesses of the individual. There was a strong case for charging drunks for stomach pumps or treatment of injuries, and pubs and clubs should also be made to contribute if their complicity could be proven.

You know, aside from this very last bit, I actually agree. I really fail to see why the taxpayer should fund the treatment of those who use up valuable resources through their own vice and stupidity. I recall that on the one occasion when I was unfortunate enough to find myself in A&E, the room was filled with the sound of drunken idiots, and a nurse told me that I was the only person in there who was not there as a result of alcohol or drugs. And this was a Tuesday night - imagine what it must be like on a Friday or a Saturday. No, as far as I'm concerned the taxes that we pay entitle us to free NHS treatment when we fall ill through natural circumstances which are no fault of our own. When, on the other hand, we fall ill entirely as a result of our own actions, then we are imposing a burden on the NHS that we could quite easily have avoided imposing, and we, not the taxpayer, should bear the cost of that.

Why do I disagree with that last bit, about pubs and clubs also being obliged to contribute? Well, basically, because it's not their fault if their customers drink too much. It is not unreasonable to expect individuals to exercise self-control, and, indeed, the Lib Dem proposals seem designed to promote the idea of personal responsibility. Thus, if you go into a pub, and have a drink, you are responsible for seeing that you exercise self-control in the amount of alcohol you consume. This is your personal responsibility, and not that of anyone else, including the person who supplies alcohol to you. To suggest that pubs and clubs should bear part of the responsibility if a drunk injures himself is to deny or reduce the personal responsibility of that drunk for his actions.

The "immigrant-dependent" NHS

An inquiry into the competence of foreign doctors has been launched by Britain's medical regulator after it was revealed that they were twice as likely to face disciplinary hearings as UK medical graduates.

According to the Times, three times the number of doctors who trained abroad were struck off the UK medical register last year compared with 2005.

The General Medical Council has commissioned a series of research projects which will look at a range of issues including the competence of foreign doctors and whether they are subject to institutional racism within the health service.

More than 5,000 cases were dealt with by the GMC in 2006, the paper said.

Of these 303 resulted in a fitness-to-practise hearing and 54 doctors were struck off - 35 of whom had trained outside the UK.

One of the common refrains in the hymn book of the pro-mass immigration left is that the NHS is completely dependent on immigrants to keep it going. However, I would point out that there are currently some 8,000 British-trained doctors who have been told that if they wish to practise in their chosen profession, then they should go abroad. And as a result of the apparently appalling application system for junior doctor positions, those who have failed to get places actually possess, on average, more impressive qualifications than those who have been successful. So it's hardly as if we're talking about utter incompetents: we're talking about people who would in all probability be excellent physicians. So why on Earth is the NHS turning these people away, in favour of second-rate foreigners, many of whom have a command of English so poor that they cannot fill in a death certificate, and of whom a more than negligible number may actually pose a positive threat to patient safety?

It seems that the NHS is no more immune to population replacement than the rest of society...

Not very NICE

Usually, when the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), the body charged with rationing out NHS funding, appears in the news, it is when it has refused treatment for people who suffer from diseases such as cancer, or Alzheimer's, on the grounds that the treatment is not cost-effective. Now, however, I read that NICE is recommending that the NHS adopts a system for the treatment of drug addicts, whereby they will be rewarded with iPods, DVDs, and televisions, should they succeed in staying off drugs.

This is idiotic in so many different ways. For a start, if drug addicts are capable of being motivated to give up drugs by means of inducements, then isn't the possibility of turning their lives around, and away from utter worthlessness, inducement enough? That's actually rather a big point: most addicts don't like being addicts, but they are. Being addicted to drugs means that they do not exercise a fully rational choice when it comes to drugs. They know that their lives would be better without them, and yet they still take them. Will it really make a big difference if they know that their lives will be better without them, and that they will have an iPod?
The second point is that made by Katherine Murphy, of the Patients Association:

Why should these people with self-inflicted problems be given priority over people who have a genuine illness? Some people with genuine disease are being forced to sell their homes for the medicines they need.

Exactly. This is public money being spent here, and frankly, I would far rather see the finite resources of the NHS being spent, so far as is possible, on the more deserving cases, such as cancer patients, rather than on people who have, like it or not, brought their problems on themselves.

I would also remind readers of the story that I wrote about in April, that misbehaving schoolchildren were being given rewards such as mountain bikes and iPods if they turned their behaviour around. Personally, I deplore the apparently increasing moves towards paying Danegeld to those who disrupt society, in the hope of making them better behaved. It is the mark of a pathetic and weak society, and will come to no good in the long run.

Hat-tip: David Vance at ATW