UK health shake-up puts doctors in charge of funds
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Britain’s new coalition government, seeking to cut a record budget deficit, announced a radical shake-up of its sprawling health service on Monday.
The reorganisation of the world’s largest public healthcare system will see family doctors take charge of the lion’s share of a 110 billion pound ($165 billion) healthcare budget.
Losing out will be thousands of managers in the National Health Service (NHS) whose jobs will be cut to slash bureaucracy and save money.
The restructuring of the NHS is politically sensitive, coming after a series of reorganisations that have yielded mixed results.
The opposition Labour party, ousted from power in May after 13 years, said the coalition of centre-right Conservatives and centrist Liberal Democrats was taking a “huge gamble” by giving doctors control of billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money.
The NHS, founded in 1948 promising “cradle to grave healthcare for all”, holds a unique position in British society.
Its ideal of good healthcare available to all, regardless of wealth, still commands near universal approval and remains unchanged in the latest reorganisation.
The Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition is protecting the NHS from deep cuts sought elsewhere in government to tackle a budget deficit of around 11 percent of GDP.
STRUCTURAL REFORMS
Health Secretary Andrew Lansley is concentrating on structural reforms he says will improve the outcomes for patients as well as saving money at a time of limited resources.
He wants patients to be able to use information about the quality of different hospitals and consultants to choose the treatment best for them.
More than 150 local health authorities in England, known as primary care trusts or PCTs will be scrapped, along with ten larger regional management bodies.
Much of the 80 billion pound budget currently spent by PCTs will devolve to family doctors or general practitioners (GPs), who will work in consortia to commission local health services, many previously handled by the scrapped authorities.
Doctors have cautiously welcomed the plans, which only apply to England, the largest part of the United Kingdom, where the NHS employs 1.3 million people.
But unions fear for administrative staff at the health authorities where jobs will disappear.
Although its budget is protected, the service still needs to make savings to fund increasing demands from an ageing population and to pay for new treatments.
The NHS, which has 1.7 employees in Britain, says only the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, the Wal-Mart supermarket chain and Indian railways directly employ more people.
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By Tim Castle
LONDON (Reuters)
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