Is Wes Streeting the Hamlet of the health service?

Is Wes Streeting the Hamlet of the Health Service? Is this undoubtedly talented and thoughtful young Labour prince fatally irresolute when it comes to doing what he knows must be done?

Few politicians have articulated so clearly the need for reform of our healthcare system. Streeting’s insistence that the NHS should be a service not a shrine angered all the right people, which is to say the BMA. It marked a welcome departure from the treacly displays of affection which have hitherto characterised ‘debate’ about the health service. More recently, the Health Secretary has frankly admitted that the NHS is letting patients down and acknowledged its manifold inefficiencies. The need for change has been recognised. The case for reform is urgent. The sickly patient lies before us, the vital signs deteriorating. But instead of action, this week we have been offered a National Conversation; in place of reform, procrastination. The native hue of resolution has been sicklied o’er by the pale cast of an internet suggestions book.

What does Wes need to know that the cold facts cannot already tell him? British citizens have the worst rate of life expectancy in western Europe. We have higher avoidable mortality rates than our neighbours. Survival rates for breast, cervical, rectal, lung, stomach and colon cancer are lower in the UK than in comparable jurisdictions. NHS patients who suffer heart attacks or strokes are more likely to die than in France, Spain, the Netherlands, Canada, Italy and New Zealand.

More than seven million people are on waiting lists for NHS treatment. Every month tens of thousands wait for more than 12 hours for treatment after being admitted to accident and emergency wards. It is then no surprise that the number of (wealthier) patients opting to pay to be treated privately is at a record level – more than 800,000 every year.