Private firm is awarded total control of NHS hospital
The first NHS hospital to be put under the total control of a private company was announced last week by the Department of Health. In a final erosion of the health service's role as sole provider of healthcare for NHS patients, labour ministers have awarded a five year contract to manage the new Lymington New Forest Hospital in Hampshire to the Partnership Health Group, a partly owned subsidiary of Care UK. Doctors and nurses will be seconded from the NHS to work alongside staff employed directly by PHG.
PHG will run all services at the 60-bed hospital, built for £36m under the private finance initiative, including the minor injuries unit, x-ray, urgent care and medical admissions. The company will deliver about 40,000 emergency and non-emergency operations and procedures.
The NHS's South Central strategic health authority said: "The contract with the independent sector provider will be the first in the country where the provider will manage the services at a whole NHS site. It is also the first contract where the independent sector will be running urgent care services with a state of the art medical admissions unit."
The authority said the move was aimed at helping to meet the government's target of treating all NHS patients within 18 weeks of a GP referral by 2008.
Karen Jennings, head of health at the public sector union Unison, said: "Handing over the running of the new hospital in Lymington represents a fundamental, seismic shift towards pushing entire communities out of the NHS and into the private sector. We fear this is just the first wave."
Mike Parish, chief executive of Care UK, said: "We are particularly pleased that this will be the first independent sector treatment centre to manage the entire range of clinical services at an NHS site."
The company expects to take over responsibility of the hospital in July.
Yvonne LeBrun, area director of care services for Hampshire primary care trust, said: "Healthcare at the Lymington New Forest Hospital will continue to be funded by the NHS and it will remain an NHS facility. Hospital services will be designed by the NHS to meet the needs of the community and will be funded from the public purse and free of charge to all."
Reproduced from:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1977982,00.html
Health Direct noted on Oct 02, 2006 that the first NHS hospital privatisation was announced and that 60 more may follow when a foundation hospital trust planned to "takeover" a smaller cash strapped NHS hospital in what is thought to be the first privatisation of its kind. The Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust in Birmingham hopes to acquire Good Hope Hospital, which is £15m in debt.
Labour's policy of outsourcing NHS staff, facilities and responsibilities is an abject admission of it's inability to manage properly a health service in the UK.
As such it is the end of the National Health Service. From the proud boast of "24 hours to save the NHS" to "10 years to kill the NHS off".
On Nov 11, 2005 Health Direct warned that Labour's policy is 'fatally flawed' a majority of PCT claim when the Labour government's policy on primary care provision has become 'fatally flawed' because of poor handling, a poll of primary care trust chief executives suggests. More than three quarters of respondents to an HSJ survey agreed with the statement that 'a badly communicated policy has now become a fatally flawed policy due to government panic'.
Ninety five per cent of those polled said 'the government badly underestimated how much opposition would be created by the transfer of staff out of the NHS'.
One chief executive said: 'The Stalinist regime at the DoH increasingly appears to have lost touch with reality. In my 20 years at the top I have never known anything to affect morale to such an extent.'
PHG will run all services at the 60-bed hospital, built for £36m under the private finance initiative, including the minor injuries unit, x-ray, urgent care and medical admissions. The company will deliver about 40,000 emergency and non-emergency operations and procedures.
The NHS's South Central strategic health authority said: "The contract with the independent sector provider will be the first in the country where the provider will manage the services at a whole NHS site. It is also the first contract where the independent sector will be running urgent care services with a state of the art medical admissions unit."
The authority said the move was aimed at helping to meet the government's target of treating all NHS patients within 18 weeks of a GP referral by 2008.
Karen Jennings, head of health at the public sector union Unison, said: "Handing over the running of the new hospital in Lymington represents a fundamental, seismic shift towards pushing entire communities out of the NHS and into the private sector. We fear this is just the first wave."
Mike Parish, chief executive of Care UK, said: "We are particularly pleased that this will be the first independent sector treatment centre to manage the entire range of clinical services at an NHS site."
The company expects to take over responsibility of the hospital in July.
Yvonne LeBrun, area director of care services for Hampshire primary care trust, said: "Healthcare at the Lymington New Forest Hospital will continue to be funded by the NHS and it will remain an NHS facility. Hospital services will be designed by the NHS to meet the needs of the community and will be funded from the public purse and free of charge to all."
Reproduced from:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1977982,00.html
Health Direct noted on Oct 02, 2006 that the first NHS hospital privatisation was announced and that 60 more may follow when a foundation hospital trust planned to "takeover" a smaller cash strapped NHS hospital in what is thought to be the first privatisation of its kind. The Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust in Birmingham hopes to acquire Good Hope Hospital, which is £15m in debt.
Labour's policy of outsourcing NHS staff, facilities and responsibilities is an abject admission of it's inability to manage properly a health service in the UK.
As such it is the end of the National Health Service. From the proud boast of "24 hours to save the NHS" to "10 years to kill the NHS off".
On Nov 11, 2005 Health Direct warned that Labour's policy is 'fatally flawed' a majority of PCT claim when the Labour government's policy on primary care provision has become 'fatally flawed' because of poor handling, a poll of primary care trust chief executives suggests. More than three quarters of respondents to an HSJ survey agreed with the statement that 'a badly communicated policy has now become a fatally flawed policy due to government panic'.
Ninety five per cent of those polled said 'the government badly underestimated how much opposition would be created by the transfer of staff out of the NHS'.
One chief executive said: 'The Stalinist regime at the DoH increasingly appears to have lost touch with reality. In my 20 years at the top I have never known anything to affect morale to such an extent.'
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