It was good to see the return of Craig Mackinlay M.P. to the House of Commons after surviving a bad attack of sepsis. But he did have to have all his legs and arms amputated – see https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-69048172 . As I have pointed out before, sepsis is exceedingly dangerous and I was very lucky to survive it myself a few years ago. See https://roliscon.blog/2024/02/08/sepsis-and-how-to-diagnose-it/ . I did not need any amputations but I could not walk again for some weeks.
A lot of media coverage in the last few days has been on the failings in the NHS over the infected blood scandal and the inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal.
In both cases civil servants employed by the Government covered up the problems and effectively delayed action. Why is this allowed to happen? Unfortunately it is a fact of life that bureaucracies always defend themselves. Nationalisation of public services will always result in similar scandals – not all might be so bad as to cause so many deaths but financial detriment will always occur.
Competent management is what is required but that is hardly common in the NHS and from my experience of working for the Post Office many years ago I would say the same about that. In the NHS people get promoted on medical or academic qualifications, not on proven management or leadership competence.
Roger Lawson (Twitter: https://twitter.com/RogerWLawson )
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