#England covid-19 pandemic

[chronicallyuniconic]

"6 out of 10 people who died from Covid between March and July 2020 were disabled"

As part of the UK covid inquiry, evidence has now been brought to light which shows that "Do Not Attempt Resuscitation" notices, were put on the files of patients with Down's Syndrome, Autism & other learning disabilities.

These people were healthy, before contracting Covid19.

The NHS watchdog we know as NICE, (the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence), issued guidance for trusts and hospitals advising them to apply a “clinical frailty scale” to decide whether patients should be admitted to intensive care.

Older and more frail patients were viewed as being less likely to survive even with critical care treatment.

The original NICE guidance also suggested that those who could not do everyday tasks like cooking, managing money and personal care independently, would be considered frail & not receive intensive care treatment.

This original guidance has since been removed....

Which leads us to the Do not attempt Resuscitation notices...

The DNAR notices were often placed on the files of the patients without their consent, or with limited understanding of its meaning.

Patients with learning disabilities were classed as 'clinically frail'

NHS England have of course denied this, yet the evidence shows they let them die, as to not overwhelm the NHS in the early days of a pandemic.

Yet many specialist nurses have come forward to say that they were constantly put in place for people with learning disabilities and often "inappropriately."

_____

I feel utterly sick. I remember at the start of the pandemic, talking about how disabled people will become a target, that we will be killed off, and people looked at me like I was purple.

4 years later we're here. In case you need to read it again, 6 in 10 people with covid that died during March to June 2020, were disabled. 6 in 10. I can't stop repeating that number.

Read more here:

https://archive.ph/4BQ3s

[covid-safer-hotties]

Here's a UK seller for most of your covid prevention needs

[jessethejestersblog]

#tbt #throwbackthursday #tbthursday

Here’s one I did 4 years ago today during the pandemic!

Check out my stuff on

[head-post]

British MI5 issues alert on Chinese spy to divert attention from PM scandal

The UK’s domestic spy agency MI5 issued an alert calling a woman a Chinese agent to allegedly divert attention from a COVID lockdown party scandal involving former prime minister Boris Johnson, according to Reuters.

In January 2022, MI5 issued an alert about lawyer Christine Lee. The agency claimed she was “involved in political interference activities” in the United Kingdom on behalf of the ruling Chinese Communist Party.

The warning was circulated among lawmakers by the Speaker of the House of Commons, who stated MI5 discovered that Lee had “facilitated financial donations to serving and aspiring parliamentarians on behalf of foreign nationals based in Hong Kong and China.”

Lee is now suing MI5 for unspecified damages. She claimed the agency acted unlawfully and unreasonably. At an Investigatory Powers Tribunal hearing on Monday, her lawyer Ramby de Mello read out a message sent to Lee from Barry Gardiner, an MP for the opposition Labour Party. Gardiner claimed he had received hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of donations from her.

He also stated “many people” believed that the timing of the alert was intended to divert attention from Johnson’s admission of an unlawful gathering at Downing Street during the first COVID lockdown. The day before the notice was issued, Johnson had apologised to parliament for attending a “bring your own booze” gathering that had been held at his official residence.

I had never believed that the Security Services would be overtly party political in that way. What has been suggested to me is that the Security Services may have wished to ‘pick a fight’ or to ‘detract attention’ from something else and that we were simply collateral damage.

De Mello stated that MI5 did not have the authority to issue an “unprecedented” notice alleging that Lee had engaged in political interference on behalf of the United Front Work Department of the Chinese Communist Party.

In their written statements, MI5’s lawyers claimed the alert (IA) was announced on national security grounds. It also aimed to protect parliamentary democracy from foreign interference.

The respondent assessed that (Lee) posed a risk of this nature, and its judgment was that the issuing of the IA was the most effective and proportionate means to address that risk. Those assessments were rational and lawful.

The hearing continues on Tuesday.

Read more HERE

[breads-voice]

Leaving the NHS was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. I have had a 10 year career within it, holding various positions, most recently as a nurse within a busy cardiology unit. A sense of duty is ingrained in us from the moment we enter University and doesn’t really leave us. We are taught the NHS is the only option, with private and non-clinical options being rarely discussed and non-NHS clinical experiences as students being nearly non-existent. Nurses have been historically seen as subservient martyrs, drawing the mental image of the ‘Lady and the Lamp’. The fact it has been seen as a female dominated profession due to the women as carers stereotype hasn’t helped. It’s a poison that has been spoon fed into the minds of the general public, that nurses ‘knew what to expect’ on entering the profession. It’s led to public disdain for nurses demanding better working conditions as ‘patients should come first’. No nurse would contradict this statement. However, the implication of this is that nurses are being expected to ignore their own, essential needs in favour of others. They need adequate rest, to feel safe on shift, hydration and nutrition. Nurses are still human. Without being able to care for themselves, they wouldn’t be able to care for their patients. 23% of nurses consider unaliving themselves. I was one of them. Resilience is crucial as a nurse due to the range of traumatic experiences we witness, but not to the point of expecting us to respond like robots. A sense of duty is important, but caring for our own physical and mental health is more important.

Nurses aren’t martyrs. They are highly educated professional and deserve their basic needs met.

[samwisethewitch]

Homemaking, gardening, and self-sufficiency resources that won't radicalize you into a hate group

It seems like self-sufficiency and homemaking skills are blowing up right now. With the COVID-19 pandemic and the current economic crisis, a lot of folks, especially young people, are looking to develop skills that will help them be a little bit less dependent on our consumerist economy. And I think that's generally a good thing. I think more of us should know how to cook a meal from scratch, grow our own vegetables, and mend our own clothes. Those are good skills to have.

Unfortunately, these "self-sufficiency" skills are often used as a recruiting tactic by white supremacists, TERFs, and other hate groups. They become a way to reconnect to or relive the "good old days," a romanticized (false) past before modern society and civil rights. And for a lot of people, these skills are inseparably connected to their politics and may even be used as a tool to indoctrinate new people.

In the spirit of building safe communities, here's a complete list of the safe resources I've found for learning homemaking, gardening, and related skills. Safe for me means queer- and trans-friendly, inclusive of different races and cultures, does not contain Christian preaching, and does not contain white supremacist or TERF dog whistles.

Homemaking/Housekeeping/Caring for your home:

Making It by Kelly Coyne and Erik Knutzen [book] (The big crunchy household DIY book; includes every level of self-sufficiency from making your own toothpaste and laundry soap to setting up raised beds to butchering a chicken. Authors are explicitly left-leaning.)

Safe and Sound: A Renter-Friendly Guide to Home Repair by Mercury Stardust [book] (A guide to simple home repair tasks, written with rentals in mind; very compassionate and accessible language.)

How To Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis [book] (The book about cleaning and housework for people who get overwhelmed by cleaning and housework, based on the premise that messiness is not a moral failing; disability and neurodivergence friendly; genuinely changed how I approach cleaning tasks.)

Gardening

Rebel Gardening by Alessandro Vitale [book] (Really great introduction to urban gardening; explicitly discusses renter-friendly garden designs in small spaces; lots of DIY solutions using recycled materials; note that the author lives in England, so check if plants are invasive in your area before putting them in the ground.)

Country/Rural Living:

Woodsqueer by Gretchen Legler [book] (Memoir of a lesbian who lives and works on a rural farm in Maine with her wife; does a good job of showing what it's like to be queer in a rural space; CW for mentions of domestic violence, infidelity/cheating, and internalized homophobia)

"Debunking the Off-Grid Fantasy" by Maggie Mae Fish [video essay] (Deconstructs the off-grid lifestyle and the myth of self-reliance)

Sewing/Mending:

Annika Victoria [YouTube channel] (No longer active, but their videos are still a great resource for anyone learning to sew; check out the beginner project playlist to start. This is where I learned a lot of what I know about sewing.)

Make, Sew, and Mend by Bernadette Banner [book] (A very thorough written introduction to hand-sewing, written by a clothing historian; lots of fun garment history facts; explicitly inclusive of BIPOC, queer, and trans sewists.)

Sustainability/Land Stewardship

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer [book] (Most of you have probably already read this one or had it recommended to you, but it really is that good; excellent example of how traditional animist beliefs -- in this case, indigenous American beliefs -- can exist in healthy symbiosis with science; more philosophy than how-to, but a great foundational resource.)

Wild Witchcraft by Rebecca Beyer [book] (This one is for my fellow witches; one of my favorite witchcraft books, and an excellent example of a place-based practice deeply rooted in the land.)

Avoiding the "Crunchy to Alt Right Pipeline"

Note: the "crunchy to alt-right pipeline" is a term used to describe how white supremacists and other far right groups use "crunchy" spaces (i.e., spaces dedicated to farming, homemaking, alternative medicine, simple living/slow living, etc.) to recruit and indoctrinate people into their movements. Knowing how this recruitment works can help you recognize it when you do encounter it and avoid being influenced by it.

"The Crunchy-to-Alt-Right Pipeline" by Kathleen Belew [magazine article] (Good, short introduction to this issue and its history.)

Sisters in Hate by Seyward Darby (I feel like I need to give a content warning: this book contains explicit descriptions of racism, white supremacy, and Neo Nazis, and it's a very difficult read, but it really is a great, in-depth breakdown of the role women play in the alt-right; also explicitly addresses the crunchy to alt-right pipeline.)

These are just the resources I've personally found helpful, so if anyone else has any they want to add, please, please do!

[theculturedmarxist]

In photos of 2023’s World Economic Forum- or Davos as it is commonly called, after the Swiss resort town where it annually occurs- you might not notice the HEPA filters. They’re in the background, unobtrusive and unremarked upon, quietly cleansing the air of viruses and bacteria. You wouldn’t know- not unless you asked- that every attendee was PCR tested before entering the forum, or that in the case of a positive test, access was automatically, electronically, revoked. And if you happened to get a glimpse of the strange blue lights overhead, you could reasonably assume that their glow was simply a modern aesthetic choice, not the calming buzz of cutting edge Far UVC technology- demonstrated to kill microbes in the air.

It’s hard to square this information with the public narrative about COVID, isn’t it? President Biden has called the pandemic “over”. The New York Times recently claimed that “the risk of Covid is similar to that of the flu” in an article about “hold outs” that are annoyingly refusing to accept continual reinfection as their “new normal”. Yet, this week the richest people in the world are taking common sense, easy- but strict- precautions to ensure they don’t catch Covid-19 at Davos.

These common sense, easy precautions include high-quality ventiliation, use of Far UVC-lighting technology, and PCR testing. You’ll also see some masks at Davos, but generally, the testing + air filtration protocol seems to be effective at preventing the kind of super-spreader events most of us are now accustomed to attending.

It seems unlikely to me that a New York Times reporter will follow the super-rich around like David Attenborough on safari, the way one of their employees did when they profiled middle-class maskers last month. I doubt they will write “family members and friends can get a little exasperated by the hyper-concern” about the assembled Prime Ministers, Presidents and CEOs in Switzerland. After all, these are important people. The kind of people who merit high-quality ventilation. The kind of people who deserve accurate tests.

Why is the media so hellbent on portraying simple, scientifically proven measures like high-quality ventilation as ridiculous and unnecessary as hundreds of people continue to die daily here in the US?

Why is the public accepting a “new normal” where we are expected to get infected over and over and over again, at work events with zero precautions, on airplanes with no masks, and at social dinners trying to approximate our 2019 normal?

We deserve better. We deserve to be #DavosSafe as the hashtag going around on twitter puts it. Your children deserve to be treated with the care that world leaders are treating each other. Your family deserves to be protected from the disease which is still- unlike the flu- the third leading cause of death in the US. We don’t deserve to be shoved back into poorly ventilated workplaces while our politicians and press assure us that only crazy people would demand to breathe clean air.

Clean water and clean food are rights we fought for; we have regulatory bodies that ensure we aren’t exposed to pathogens via our water supply nor our food. In 1854, John Snow famously conducted his Broad Street Pump study in London and demonstrated that cholera was water-bourne; however, it took decades for our public policy to catch up with our scientific knowledge.

A public health case study published by the NBCI describes the years that followed:

The first use of chlorine as a disinfectant for water facilities was in 1897 in England. The first use of this method for municipal water facilities in the United States was in Jersey City, New Jersey, and Chicago, Illinois, in 1915. Other cities followed and the use of chlorination as standard treatment for water disinfection rapidly grew. During the 20th century, death rates from waterborne diseases decreased significantly, and although other additional factors contributed to the general improvements in health (such as sanitation, improved quality of life, and nutrition), the improvement of water quality was, without doubt, a major reason.

Forty-three years passed from the initial demonstration that pathogens were being spread via water, and public action and regulation to halt disease.

Can you imagine, in the 1890s, being somebody who argued against cleaning the water?

Can you imagine, in those years of plentiful cholera, calling the people who demanded shit-free water “hold outs”?

One thing COVID realists are accused of is being “doomsayers” and “fearmongers,” so let me share a dose of optimism about the future with you. When we choose- whenever we choose- to get COVID under control, there’s an exciting new world awaiting us. One, not only without constant COVID reinfection, but where our kids can grow up free of colds, flus, RSV, and many other common bugs. And no, contrary to what you may have heard, staying healthy (shockingly enough) is not bad for children!

Once we choose to institute ventilation standards and introduce new technologies like Far UVC lighting- and embrace masking as an easy, kind, and useful tool to control outbreaks- we can bring every nasty airborne pathogen under control the way we did cholera. We didn’t have the science before; now we do. (I mean that quite literally; I can’t recommend enough the linked Wired article cataloguing the long journey to establishing that Covid is, indeed, airborne).

We face a stark choice; down one road, the one with zero infrastructure upgrades, no air quality regulations, and Covid safety only for those who can afford it, you and your family will get Covid this year. You will get Covid next year. You will continue to get Covid over and over and over again, as the health problems - like cardiac damage, viral persistance, and immune system dysfunction- continue to build up. (The billionaires, of course, will not).

Down the other road, we quite simply treat ourselves the way Davos would. We engage with what the science is telling us and we build a safer, better world for our kids. We embrace the lessons this pandemic is teaching us, and let go of things we now know are harming people. We stop clinging desperately to the idea that 2019 will come back if we just get the virus one more time, and we come together to achieve what we’ve been told is impossible: elimination.

The economic elite thrive on our divisiveness and blame casting. They don’t mind that we’re calling each other names, engaging in racial stereotyping, or leaving disabled people to die, so long as we keep their machine running. But we can choose to stop throwing blame at each other, and direct it where it belongs: at the powerful people who’ve left us to suffer, at the politicians who are whipping people into a frenzy over masks instead of over our millions of dead, at the talking heads on TV that work so hard to convince us: you want to get sick. It’s better than being a *weirdo* or a *hold out*.

We needn’t wait 43 years to redirect our energies. France and Belgium have already introduced new air quality standards, and DIY projects to build Corsi-Rosenthal boxes for schools and healthcare settings have popped up around the country. We have the science, we have the technology. All we need now is the political will and the solidarity to truly end the pandemic- the kind of solidarity the super rich always show with one another.

The billionaires at Davos don’t accept continual Covid reinfection. They demand better. It’s time we demand better too.

[reasonsforhope]

I'm sorry I'm sending so many asks. I've been struggling like this for a year now, and it's barely gotten easier, but you've often been a good help with my anxiety. I really appreciate everything you do. It's hard to have hope.

I've had a really bad moment again recently. I have to be honest, the worst thing, that makes me the most anxious out of everything else, is COVID. Because it feels like nobody is paying attention, and that there is no good news. There is never any good news. COVID is always the catalyst for the worst of my anxious slumps. It's really bad. COVID is very, very scary. If you somehow have anything for that, I'd be thankful. Often I've only been able to set my heart on nasal vaccines, or next gen vaccines in general, but they're not going fast enough whatsoever.

I'm sorry, again. I don't want to try and treat you like a therapist. I just trust you. If this is too overwhelming, you can just delete it, but if you do, I'd like to know. Just so I'm not waiting for it to be answered.

I just ravaged through someone's doomy collapse blog, again, after stumbling on it in my rising anxiousness, and it was not good. I think I'm clearly too open-minded of a person to some degree, and I feel so pulled around by information that I see. I don't want to be placated, out of the loop, or lied to, but I don't want to feel hopelessly depressed. Everything is too complex. I feel like I've been through this maze, top to bottom, over and over again, and again. I just wish I knew how much truth their words held, or anyone else's words held.

And I wish we were all masking, at the very least. I'm holding myself back from swearing. I don't know if you'd have a good way to counteract general "collapse" thoughts, either. But that's also a thing.

<3 I'm touched by your trust.

I just found some good news about COVID - the first genuinely good covid-related news article I've seen in a while, instead of all of the "ah but young abled people are fine!" bs - and remembered this ask.

"As new varieties of the coronavirus took center stage during the COVID-19 pandemic, the odds of developing long COVID dropped. Those who were vaccinated against the virus saw the biggest plunge over time.

For every 1,000 unvaccinated people, 104 developed long COVID up to one year after an infection during the pre-delta phase of the pandemic. That fell to 95 per 1,000 during the delta variant’s era and 78 during omicron’s reign. Among vaccinated people, just 53 out of 1,000 developed long COVID up to a year after infection during delta and only 35 during omicron, researchers report July 17 [2024] in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The study of U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Health Care System data looked at people who had a COVID infection from March of 2020 — the month the pandemic began — to the end of January in 2022. The researchers, from the Veterans Affairs St. Louis Health Care System, compared the rates of long COVID during three phases of the pandemic among those who had and had not gotten vaccinated...

A comparison of omicron infections with infections from prior eras found that 72 percent of the drop in the long COVID rate during omicron was attributable to vaccines. The remainder was due to changes in the virus and improvements in medical care and the use of antiviral treatments during the omicron phase.

Even with the steep decline in the occurrence of long COVID for vaccinated people, there is still a risk, the researchers write. With “the large numbers of ongoing new infections and reinfections, and the poor uptake of vaccination,” they continue, this “may translate into a high number of persons” with long COVID."

-via ScienceNews, July 17, 2024

--

Masking continues to be important. The virus continues to be a problem. But especially given the decline in masking, I'm really encouraged to see this news. Because long covid IS scary. And I'll take any good news on this front that I can get.

It's especially encouraging because it shows how much staying on top of your vaccinations really does matter and really can prevent long covid.

I'm also really hopeful (though I don't have a related background and have no idea how realistic my hopes are) that this trend has been continuing past the end of the study (2022).

[afeelgoodblog]

The Best News of Last Week - June 20, 2023

🐕 - Meet Sheep Farm's Newest Employee: Collie Hired After Ejection from Car!

1. Border Collie ejected from car during Sunday crash found on sheep farm, herding sheep

Tilly, the 2-year-old Border Collie who was ejected from a car Sunday during a crash, has been found. He was found on a sheep farm, where he had apparently taken up the role of sheep herder. 

According to Tilly's owner, he has lost some weight since Sunday's crash and is now drinking lots of water but is otherwise healthy.

2. After 17-Year Absence, White Rhinos Return to the Democratic Republic of the Congo

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) recently welcomed the reintroduction of 16 southern white rhinoceroses to Garamba National Park, according to officials. The last wild northern white rhino was poached there in 2006.

The white rhinos were transported to Garamba, which lies in the northeastern part of the country, from a South African private reserve. In the late 19th century, the southern white rhino subspecies was believed to be extinct due to poaching until a population of fewer than 100 was discovered in South Africa in 1895, according to WWF.

3. UK to wipe women’s historic convictions for homosexuality

Women with convictions for some same-sex activity in the United Kingdom can apply for a pardon for the first time, the Home Office has announced.

The Home Office is widening its scheme to wipe historic convictions for homosexual activity more than a decade after the government allowed applications for same-sex activity offences to be disregarded.

It means anyone can apply for a pardon if they have been convicted or cautioned for any same-sex activity offences that have been repealed or abolished.

4. Study shows human tendency to help others is universal

A new study on the human capacity for cooperation suggests that, deep down, people of diverse cultures are more similar than you might expect. The study, published in Scientific Reports, shows that from the towns of England, Italy, Poland, and Russia to the villages of rural Ecuador, Ghana, Laos, and Aboriginal Australia, at the micro scale of our daily interaction, people everywhere tend to help others when needed.

5. In a First, Wind and Solar Generated More Power Than Coal in U.S.

Wind and solar generated more electricity than coal through May, an E&E News review of federal data shows, marking the first time renewables have outpaced the former king of American power over a five-month period.

The milestone illustrates the ongoing transformation of the U.S. power sector as the nation races to install cleaner forms of energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels.

6. Iceland becomes latest country to ban conversion therapy

Lawmakers in Iceland on June 9 approved a bill that will ban so-called conversion therapy in the country.

Media reports note 53 members of the Icelandic Parliament voted for the measure, while three MPs abstained. Hanna Katrín Friðriksson, an MP who is a member of the Liberal Reform Party, introduced the bill.

7. The temple feeding 100,000 people a day

Amritsar, the north Indian city known for its Golden Temple and delicious cuisine, is also renowned for its spirit of generosity and selfless service. The city, founded by a Sikh guru, embodies the Sikh tradition of seva, performing voluntary acts of service without expecting anything in return.

This spirit of giving extends beyond the temple walls, as the Sikh community has shown immense compassion during crises, such as delivering oxygen cylinders during the COVID-19 pandemic. At the heart of Amritsar's generosity is the Golden Temple's langar, the world's largest free communal kitchen, serving 100,000 people daily without discrimination. Despite a history marred by tragic events, Amritsar continues to radiate kindness, love, and generosity.

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That's it for this week :)

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Also don’t forget to reblog.

[mariacallous]

Britain was hit far harder by the Covid-19 pandemic than other developed countries because the NHS had been “seriously weakened” by disastrous government policies over the preceding decade, a wide-ranging report will conclude this week.

An assessment of the NHS by the world-renowned surgeon Prof Ara Darzi, commissioned in July by the health secretary, Wes Streeting, will find that the health service reduced its “routine healthcare activity by a far greater percentage than other health systems” in many key areas during the Covid crisis.

Hip and knee replacements, for instance, fell by 46% and 68% respectively. Hospital discharges as a whole dropped by 18% between 2019 and 2020 in the UK compared with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development average of 10%, Lord Darzi will say.

In a key section of his report, the crossbench peer will also conclude that the NHS is still suffering the aftereffects of its inability to respond adequately to the Covid shock at the time.

“The state of the NHS today cannot be understood without recognising quite how much care was cancelled, discontinued, or postponed during the pandemic … The pandemic’s impact was magnified because the NHS had been seriously weakened in the decade preceding its onset.”

Darzi will be particularly critical of former Tory health secretary Andrew Lansley’s top-down reorganisation of the NHS under David Cameron’s prime ministership, which he will say “scorched the earth for health reform”.

“The Health and Social Care Act of 2012 was a calamity without international precedent – it proved disastrous,” Darzi will say, adding: “The result of the disruption was a permanent loss of capability from the NHS … This is an important part of the explanation for the deterioration in performance of the NHS as a whole.

“Rather than liberating the NHS, as it had promised, the Health and Social Care Act 2012 imprisoned more than a million NHS staff in a broken system for the best part of a decade.”

Lord Lansley defended his reforms, saying Darzi should be focusing on the “here and now” rather than reaching back over a decade for a “blame the Tories” narrative.

“The 2012 act created NHS England. It empowered the NHS. It reduced administration costs by £1.5bn. Waiting times fell to their lowest level. The longest waits were virtually eliminated,” said Lansley. He added that if his plans had been fully implemented, they would have made the NHS more internationally competitive.

The Tories are preparing to criticise the Darzi report as politically driven because its author was a minister under the previous Labour government and was a member of the Labour party until he resigned in 2019.

Labour will, however, point to his impressive CV and the fact that he held prominent positions while the Tories were in power, including sitting as the UK global ambassador for health and life sciences from 2009 until March 2013. Also, in 2015, Darzi was appointed as nonexecutive director of the NHS regulatory body Monitor, which oversaw the quality and performance management of healthcare in England.

The Darzi report – which will also find that more than 100,000 infants (0 to two-year-olds) were left waiting for more than six hours in A&E departments in England last year – is being seen as a watershed moment by senior NHS figures.

Streeting is expected to use the report as the foundation for his own blue-sky thinking on reform. The current NHS England long-term plan introduced in 2019 was drawn up before the pandemic, which has caused waiting lists to lengthen to a point where 6.39 million people are waiting for 7.62m treatments.

Streeting said last year that he believed the NHS required three big shifts, from sickness to prevention, from hospitals to GPs and community services, and from an “analogue service to one that embraces the technological revolution”.

Two other key reports to be published this week also paint a bleak picture of the health service’s prospects under current spending constraints.

A survey of trust chief executives and finance directors by NHS Providers, the membership organisation for hospital, mental health, community and ambulance service users, has found more than half (51%) to be “extremely concerned” about their ability to deliver on their priorities within the tight financial limits for 2024-5.

Nine out of 10 thought the financial situation more challenging than last year. Among the measures they were having to consider were “extending vacancy freezes”, “reducing substantive staffing numbers” and “scaling back services”.

Sir Julian Hartley, chief executive of NHS Providers, said that with funding so tight the message was that ways had to be found to secure multi-year investment in reforms that would increase productivity “instead of this stop-start approach to NHS funding which leaves them constantly worrying about budget cuts followed by quick fix, short- term funding announcements”.

In addition, a report from the NHS Confederation and healthcare consultancy CF (Carnall Farrar) has found that Labour’s pledge to create an extra 40,000 appointments a week in England would not stop waiting lists from rising.

It would only deliver 15% of what was needed to ensure 92% of patients start routine hospital treatment within 18 weeks – a key target that has not been hit for nearly a decade.

Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said it was unlikely that there would be any significant reduction in waiting lists until spring or summer next year.

He added: “We need to be realistic about the fact that unless we do some pretty transformative stuff, demand is going to grow substantially. Almost everyone agrees we need to transform the NHS by investing in prevention. To do that, you have to double run [opening new services before old ones close].

“None of those things can be achieved for free. What we need from Rachel Reeves is a recognition that the long-term sustainability of the health service, the public sector and the economy as a whole, rests on shifting the health demand curve.”

Speaking to the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg on Sunday morning, the prime minister, Keir Starmer, will echo Darzi’s assessment, saying the Tories “broke” the NHS in ways that were “unforgivable”.

He will add: “Our job now, through Lord Darzi, is properly to understand how that came about and bring about the reforms, starting with the first steps, the 40,000 extra appointments.”

[covid-safer-hotties]

hey do you have a quick link to something talking about how keeping your heart rate down while recovering is helpful? friend just got covid for a 3rd time and i want to try and convince them this time that it’s something to take seriously

Here's a selection of materials that give generally good advice:

(A reason or two why you should take it easy)

[jessethejestersblog]

#tbt #throwbackthursday #tbthursday

Here’s one I did 4 years ago today during height of the pandemic!

Check out my stuff on

[head-post]

Why UK doctors strike and stress

Junior doctors working in England’s National Health Service started a six-day strike over wages on Wednesday, a desperate move in a demoralised NHS suffering from huge workloads, staff shortages and lack of investment, according to Politico.

Healthcare workers are demanding pay rises since 2022 to keep up with inflation, which is also part of a wider sense of dissatisfaction among staff who feel overworked and undervalued, especially following the COVID-19 pandemic.

UK healthcare faces challenges on all fronts. Firstly, there are fewer doctors per capita than any other country in Europe. Secondly, healthcare providers and think tanks have systematically reported staff shortages and expressed alarm over the impact on patient care and workforce.

Moreover, underinvestment led to the NHS being ill-prepared for emergencies and staggered in the aftermath of the pandemic. This had a negative impact on staff morale.

Read more HERE

[ralfmaximus]

The NHS has sounded an alarm with a 10-day Covid warning, calling for vigilance as the number of cases climbs. According to recent figures released by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), there's been a 17.8% week-on-week increase in Covid infections in England and a sharp 27.3% rise in related fatalities.

Do you long for the early days of 2020?

Do you miss the uncertainty & fear of impending pandemic?

Well... miss it no more! We're probably ramping up for COVID 2024: The Re-Re-Pandemicking Part II / Electric Boogaloo!

Note however that this is entirely a UK problem, since here in AMERICA we know that viruses are a hoax, banning masks in public reduces mass shootings, and God hates furries for making students shit in litter boxes. Sigh.

[just-a-lil-anguria]

So in the 1900s, humanity had to face a pandemic (cholera), then King Edward VII of England died (1910), the Titanic sunk (1912) and after taking part to a long conflict (that was initially thought to be a blitzkreig) Russia had to retreat because of an internal coup.

In the 2000s, humanity had to face a pandemic (covid-19), then Queen Elizabeth II of England died (2022), the Titan sunk (2023) and after taking part to a long conflict (that was initially thought to be a blitzkreig) Russia had to retreat because of an internal coup.

History really does repeat itself, huh?

[thoughtlessarse]

Trust me, no one, even in public health or medicine, wants to talk or think about Covid-19. The trauma of those pandemic years is burnt into our minds. But, whether we want to deal with it or not, Covid-19 is still affecting all of us, and circulating at fairly high levels in Britain this month. While community surveys are no longer conducted by the Office for National Statistics to estimate overall cases, hospital data from England indicates that the weekly hospital admission rate for Covid-19 is at 4.64 for every 100,000 people, with the north-east region at 8.91. These figures just cover people who are admitted to hospital and don’t reflect those suffering at home or attending GP clinics. While we were mainly fixated on death rates during the pandemic, the longer legacy concerns people who had and cleared the infection, but are still suffering – what is usually referred to as long Covid. This chronic condition still has many questions hanging over it. We are still learning about its overall prevalence in the population (estimated at 5.5% of those infected in the UK in one study, and 15% in another study from the US), and there is continuing research on the underlying biology and immunology behind symptoms, including attempts to identify markers for diagnosis, as well as work towards promising treatments. Sufferers have had to fight first to have their condition recognised as “real” (instead of a figment of their imagination or a sign of mental weakness), and second for medical services to provide support and care. Recent concerns about economic inactivity (that is, people who could be in the workforce or looking for employment, but aren’t) are tied to the growing percentage of those unable to function due to long Covid. A study in the Lancet in August 2021 estimated that 22% of people with long Covid were unable to work, and 45% were on reduced hours. A 2023 study from the US surveyed more than 15,000 people with prior Covid-19 infection and found that 40% who reported symptoms were unemployed. The authors, looking at the issue from an economic perspective, noted that “acute Covid is a pandemic; long Covid could be a mass disabling event”.

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