NHS WAITING lists in England could more than double in the coming months, from the current figure of 5.3 million people to around 13 million according to Health Secretary Javid as his government chases the spectre of ‘herd immunity’ at the expense of the population to get capitalism going again.
Javid insists that the remaining government restrictions will be lifted on July 19th.
Javid also revealed that waiting lists were now his priority, and that he was already in a state of shock over the crisis in the NHS.
He told The Sunday Telegraph: ‘What shocked me the most is when I was told that the waiting list is going to get a lot worse before it gets better.
‘It’s gone up from 3.5 million to 5.3 million as of today, and I said to the officials, so what do you mean “a lot worse”, thinking maybe it goes from 5.3 million to six million, seven million. They said no, it’s going to go up by millions … it could go as high as 13 million.’
Among Javid’s ‘solutions’ is to bring private healthcare providers into the NHS to make a fortune out of treating NHS patients. Another is to make all appointments with doctors virtual, ending the doctor patient relationship that has been at the heart of the NHS.
The situation is that in May almost a third of hospitals had seen long waits for treatment increase – with more than 10% of patients going a year or more without treatment.
In March, around five million patients were waiting for surgery – the highest number since modern records began.
This news comes as Covid case numbers rose above 30,000 for the fourth day in a row on Saturday, amid concerns over the move to end most of England’s remaining curbs on July 19th.
Javid’s expectation is that virus cases will reach 100,000 a day over the summer.
Statistician Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter considers that hospital admissions would reach 2,500 a day, and said it was ‘absolutely inevitable’ that the UK would soon experience ‘a big wave of cases’.
Prof Spiegelhalter’s hope was that since patients would likely be much younger they will require shorter stays in hospitals and would survive the ordeal.
Prof Helen Stokes-Lampard, chairwoman of the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the academy was ‘cautious about issuing dire warnings’ but she had become ‘profoundly concerned’ over the last couple of weeks about the idea of lifting restrictions in England on 19 July.
She said: ‘There seems to be a misapprehension that life will return to normal from then and that we can throw away all the precautions and, frankly, that would be dangerous.’
Already UK hospitals are announcing that non-urgent surgery is being postponed because of rising admissions of Covid patients, very high patient numbers at A&E, and staff self-isolating.
In Wales, home births were suspended by the Swansea Bay health board due to the number of staff self-isolating or unwell.
Health experts in Scotland said clinicians were ‘resigned’ to spiralling Covid cases putting more pressure on health services in the coming weeks.
Suggestions have been made that the app that decides whether hospital staff are infected and should be sent home should be modified so as to allow a greater number to remain at work, and no doubt spread the virus.
So far, 45.7 million vaccine first doses have been distributed by the NHS across the UK – more than 86% of all UK adults.
Meanwhile, experts have warned it is possible to catch two coronavirus variants at the same time after an unvaccinated 90-year-old woman in Belgium became sick with the Alpha and Beta types simultaneously.
It is obvious that the Tory government is more concerned about the health of the capitalist economy than the health of the population.
Trade unions should insist that the July 19th ‘freedom day’ is postponed and that all the regulations remain, including that masks must be worn on buses, tubes and trains.
Millions of people must not have to learn how to live or die with Covid-19. It must be stamped out as it was in the Chinese deformed workers’ state.
The key to the situation is on no account to learn to live with the Johnson government. It must be brought down and replaced with a workers’ government that will use all of the resources available to defeat the virus, and return to normality, and better, after consigning capitalism to the ‘dustbin of history’ with a socialist revolution.