The blog with no name

This article is definitely US based. But I see similarities with certain things in the UK and other examples can be found with not much effort.

But the high cost of poverty was brought home to me within a few days of my entry into the low-wage life, when, slipping into social-worker mode, I chastised a co-worker for living in a motel room when it would be so much cheaper to rent an apartment. Her response: Where would she get the first month's rent and security deposit it takes to pin down an apartment? The lack of that amount of capital -- probably well over $1,000 -- condemned her to paying $40 a night at the Day's Inn.

This is very true, I've met people in London that stayed in hostels long term as they could not afford to pay one months rent and one months deposit.
The same is also becoming increasingly common as it is more and more impossible for anyone not related to Richard Branson to have enough money for a mortgage. Therefore people are forced to continue to fork out money for a high rent which is only making some fat rich landlord fatter and richer.
And those cases are a catch 22 scenario, as you spend so much each month in rent you will never be able to save enough to get out of that.

Home content insurances are more expensive if you live in a poor area.
Without a car and a PC your shopping options are limited and that might mean that you cannot shop around for cheaper options.

You don't have a freezer and you cannot buy in bulk thus saving money. And so on.

At least 41 pensioners were killed by a hospital superbug in the squalid wards of Stoke Mandeville because senior executives ignored the dangers and concentrated on delivering the government's waiting time targets, health inspectors warned yesterday.

Even after a public outcry prompted an investigation by the Healthcare Commission, the renowned hospital in Aylesbury failed to introduce basic measures of infection control. Earlier this year, when the NHS trust had supposedly corrected its mistakes, inspectors witnessed "dirty wards, dirty toilets and commodes, bedding and equipment lying on floors, faeces on bed rails, pubic hair in baths, mould and cobwebs in showers".

They went into the hospital to investigate three outbreaks of Clostridium difficile, a deadly bacterium that has infected 498 patients at Stoke Mandeville since October 2003. Anna Walker, the commission's chief executive, said there were "serious failings on the part of senior managers who did not follow advice on stopping the spread of infection". Members of the trust board "mistakenly prioritised other objectives such as the achievement of government targets, the control of finances and the reconfiguration of services".

Full article

Today is my "complain about the NHS day".
I hate the word target anyway.
The article above describes what I hope is an extreme case. But I have doubts about other hospitals after what I've seen in a couple of London hospitals.
Firstly, I have encountered several hospitals cleaners who as usual were not employed by the hospital, not even by the subcontractors but were casual workers that worked for an agency. I talked to a couple of them and to be honest to them it's just a temporary job, they could not care less. This week here, next week elsewhere.
I think that if you are not committed to your employees, employees are not going to show much commitment and pride in their jobs. I can see the same pattern in my casually employed postmen. At least twice a week I get mail addressed to someone else, I still don't know where my mail goes. Every other week we get a different postman.
The other issue is that nobody seems to take responsibility, if a cleaner does not work properly there is nobody that feels has the right or duty to do something about it now, there might be a procedure of reporting poor performances but it does not seem to be immediate. They are not employed by the NHS so who cares?
I don't have any figures with me but I would not be surprised if the practice of subcontracting these services is actually more expensive to the NHS than employing and managing people directly.
Secondly, I've seen hospitals where the visiting hours were from 10 am to 8pm. (It's cheaper to get relatives and friends to do the nurses job after all). I' ve seen people having the whole office coming to visit, no joke it was about 20 people all at once for one patient, they had a bloody party in there. Surely that it's not the way to keep the place clean, especially as you will not see any cleaners until the following morning.
I'd better stop ranting.

Private clinics set up to carry out minor surgery have not brought major benefit to the NHS, MPs believe.

A network of independent sector treatment centres (ISTCs) has been established in England to drive down waiting lists and increase choice.

The Commons health committee says waiting lists have fallen but this is more likely to be due to extra money in the NHS than the impact of the ISTCs.

It also warned that the programme could lead to cuts in services at hospitals.

Full article
Somehow I have always had the feeling that this was not going to work.
Someone is making money though.

The report said the centres were "poorly integrated" with the NHS and were not training doctors.

They said putting the extra money spent on ISTCs into the NHS may have been a cheaper and more efficient option.