WISHING YOU ALL A HEALTHY, HAPPY, & HARMONIOUS NEW YEAR 2009
Anant
Category Archives: Health and wellness
WISHING YOU ALL A VERY CALM, CONFLICT-FREE & COHESIVE NEW YEAR
Dear Friends, Country-men, women and visitors
This is wishing you and your respective families and friends, a very happy, healthy and rewarding New Year.
With kindest thoughts and best wishes
Anant
Filed under Health and wellness
Being attuned with your green spaces can increase your life
Comment: I have championed the protection of rural England during the pre-election Hustings in April 2005 and during my involvement in the MK2031 Expansion Consultations.
Milton Keynes is going to expect about 70,000 new houses by 2034. Besides needing infrastructure for roads, services, water supply and drainage (not to mention schools, extra surgeries) it will need to retain the green spaces that makes it unique and increase some recreational spaces rather than loose them in the building frenzy that is to follow.
This is all the more persuasive upon the MKP (Milton Keynes Partnership which includes the Council, The MK PCT and Mk Gen NHS Trust etc) to pressurise the Govt in listening to the future health equalities and needs of the diverse population of MK and to facilitate free access to all green spaces for long leisurely walks coupled with better Older People Services at all levels.
Filed under Health and wellness
LABOUR’S NATIONAL HEALTH OR (MORE LIKE) NATIONAL STEALTH SERVICE?
In 1948 Aneurin Bevan developed his plan a NHS assuming, quite logically, that over the years the nation’s health would improve and hence it would be less expensive to run the NHS. But despite billions of pounds ploughed in as alleged by Labour (which several Chief Executives of PCTs [ Primary Care Trusts have told me they have never seen] and billions wasted in nonsensical pursuits like the £6.2 bn state-of-the-art IT system which actually cost 4 times as much and which no one wants or wants to use and overmanning of the NHS with more target-driven, pen-pushing beds-space chasing managers than actual service providers now resulting in having to make more than 20,000 staff redundant (at which cost might one ask?) – the list of incompetent Government devolving incompetent Boards and management through out the nation is endless as it is shameless. The patient care of the most vulnerable and with it the health of the nation has suffered a severe thrombosis. No one likes to or even wants to admit it but the cost mounts. No one is taking of saving the waste. But everyone is taking of rationing. But on what grounds?
National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE – a nice one) has to decide on rationing priorities. Last week it advised that drugs that delay the onset of Alzheimer’s should not generally be available on the NHS. This is like rubbing salt into the wound for the patients and their relations. If not NICE should Politicians be made to confront such unpopular decisions? Some one suggested that the trouble with democracy is that it makes unpopular decisions difficult to make. And such wise theorists are quick to suggest that sometimes unpopular decisions need to be made.
I totally disagree. If this incompetent Govt and its incompetent delivery vehicles in the NHS had better managed their projects and funds from May 1997 – the need ever to make unpopular decisions ought not have arisen.
As I have stressed before that those most vulnerable members of our society (with mental health issues) including the elderly are discriminated against. The NHS under this laughable Labour Govt can afford £1.5bn on (incompetent) management consultants but cannot afford a meagre £2.50 per day for its Alzheimer’s patients! NICE (an ironic abbreviation) decided it was not cost-effective to give three drugs to patients with early onset of Alzheimer’s but only to those on medium or severe Alzheimer’s. Meanwhile they have been administrating anti-psychotic drugs (with detrimental side effects) to elderly sufferers of dementia only to sedate troublesome patients as opposed to providing a number of skilled staff to look after them. Such neglect is rampant in many geriatric wards and private homes. Politicians are pretending that they do not have elderly parents or that they themselves, somehow, will be spared from such degrading affliction.
As I have said a number of times before – the true measure of a ‘civilisation’ is how it treats its most vulnerable and disadvantaged citizens.
latest 1 Nov 2006: NHS was never safe in their hands: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6103290.stm
Filed under Health and wellness
George Bernard Shaw – a shaw-off?
"I look my age. It is everyone else who looks older than they are. But what can you expect from people who eat corpses." George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) when asked at age 84 how he maintained such a youthful appearance. He was a vegetarian.
Comment: I am not a vegetarian at all times. Does it make me look older? I know some of you are going to have a field day. Enjoy.
Filed under Health and wellness
A MILLION BLESSINGS JUST FOR YOU; YES YOU
From the 14th Century, in the ruined city of Hampi, Karnataka, south India
Filed under Health and wellness
Gates – the Farista – divine donor – gives £155 million to HIV research.
It is the Gates Foundation’s biggest ever investment in HIV and Aids
The money is being split into 16 grants for science teams across the world – with the aim that they work more collaboratively on new approaches.
The 16 grants are being divided between 165 investigators in 19 countries – some of whom are well-known in the area of HIV/Aids research and some who are lesser known.
Comment: This man and this couple is reverent and needs to be revered for their altruistic philanthropy for the benefit of the Man kind globally. They are delivering and have delivered more than any single government or even the ineffective G8, Live Aid or Live8 has done. They deserve a very special obeisance in humble Indian style. I am totally touched beyond any word can express.
Exemplarily they have shown that both heaven and hell are not ethereal truths but the existing truths on this Earth. For those suffering from the terminal hell and inevitability of this condition – their intervention for many will be heaven sent.
They are changing this World for the better not by their words and philosophy alone but by sharing their earned wealth unconditionally.
Filed under Health and wellness
Is NHS Safer in New Labour’s Hands?
17 July 2006
New Reform publication: Investment in the NHS – facing up to the reform agenda
Key points
Reform has today published its latest report on NHS policy. Investment in the NHS – facing up to the reform agenda, by Nick Bosanquet, Professor of Health Policy at Imperial College London et al, argues that a new investment approach, based on public private partnership, is urgently needed to unlock improvements in care. The report is available at www.reform.co.uk.
§ NHS capital investment is now vital to act as a catalyst for service redesign, which is urgently needed to meet the mounting pressures of faster access and greater efficiency. But spending in recent years has concentrated on over-expensive buildings that may not be sustainable in the new environment of choice and payment by results; and now the service appears to be imposing a freeze on investment just when the benefits of new projects are most needed. The report argues that local managers need to identify a new wave of manageable schemes will be affordable and justified by local demand.
§ The report argues that the NHS reform agenda – payment by results, patient choice and practice based commissioning – means that large hospital building schemes will only be appropriate in certain situations. Much more common will be smaller and simpler units which do not have to be owned by the NHS but could be leased to NHS providers. Given the tight financial environment, new investment projects will only take place through public private partnerships.
§ The report’s key points are:
– There is a strong requirement for the NHS to invest if it is to achieve a more flexible pattern of services closer to patients. New investment can lead to greater efficiency by acting as a catalyst for service redesign, in particular by developing care in the primary care sector.
– Despite the urgent need and potential benefits for new investment, the current attitude of NHS managers appears to be based on caution and reluctance. There was a significant NHS capital underspend in 2005-06 of £1.2 billion, double the level of £0.6 billion in 2004-05. The underspend is likely to be repeated in 2006-07.
– The actual causes of the unwillingness to invest are deficits, partly due to an over-expansion of capital projects since 1999-00; a lack of financial information and knowledge of costs; and crude attempts by the Department to retrench on spending.
– Some areas of the country plan for considerably more investment in PFI schemes than others. The West Midlands and London Strategic Health Authorities plan to spend four times as much per head of population than the South East Coast SHA. Trusts which have much less contracted expenditure – current as well as capital – are going to be much better placed in the near future to cope with the rigours of the reform agenda as they will find it easier to adjust to variations in revenue.
– Public private partnerships, such as the Private Finance Initiative, have been a major step forward on traditional public sector procurement. It would be unfair and wrong for the failings of some “white elephant” schemes to be laid at the door of such partnerships.
– To achieve a sustainable basis for new investment, some key policy themes should be established:
– Greater awareness of costs. Payment by results introduces a clear standard of obsolescence: capital is obsolete if it cannot earn a return under the tariff.
– Local decision-making. In effect the NHS needs to invest in a new range of dispersed centres which can make more effective use of its investment in human capital.
– Patient choice. Not only will money follow the patient but also funding and investment too.
– Public private partnership. With the tight outlook for public spending it is highly unlikely that there will be new funding from the public sector.
– Large hospital building schemes are only appropriate in certain situations. For different schemes the model needs to change so as to allow increased local freedom and flexibility. Key principles of new investment projects will include, for example, setting depreciation periods in relation to the earning life of the assets in the local environment rather than in relation to a fixed rule from the centre. This will often be much less than 30 years.
– In effect the NHS should move to a modular system which could fund investment of various sizes from £5-30 million. One option would be for property companies to own buildings and rent them to an operating company, whether NHS, for-profit or charitable. It is unnecessary and inefficient for the NHS to own so much capital.
§ Both The Times and BBC News Online reported on the report this morning. The report in The Times noted that Reform is “the market-oriented think tank that was the first to predict the NHS funding crisis and the need to cut jobs". Coverage is available at www.reform.co.uk.
§ The new report follows on from the earlier Reform NHS reports Staffing and human resources in the NHS – facing up to the reform agenda (April 2006) and The NHS in 2010: reform or bust (December 2005).
ANNA CALVERT
Office Manager
REFORM
45 Great Peter Street
London
SW1P 3LT
Tel 020 7799 6699
Fax 020 7233 4446
Mobile 07736 285 957
www.reform.co.uk
Reform is an independent, non-party think tank whose mission is to set out a better way to deliver public services and economic prosperity
Comment: REFORM, in my view, has omitted a very crucial word – competence – from their categorised assessment. This Govt is incompetent. the evidence is too stark for all to see and suffer in silence accepting more health inequalities.
MPs attack ‘mess’ & unfairness of NHS charges:
"It is basically wrong to make money out of patients and their families."
Comment: The uncommon common sense tells us that but does the Govt listen? It must now be made to listen.
Filed under Health and wellness
Jewel of the Scientific Research in the UK
This new research facility, Diamond Light Source, represents the UK’s largest scientific investment for 30 years.
The futuristic construction is home to a huge scientific contraption that will, quite literally, shine a light on the tiny particles that make up the world.
As well as furthering our understanding of nature, it will help develop new materials, drugs and electronics – and even make our food taste better.
Diamond’s beamlines will be employed in many different areas of science.
One, for example, will be used to probe the atomic structure of magnetic materials; another will show what happens to materials in "extreme conditions", such as very high pressures and temperatures; and another will help the study of complex molecular structures like viruses, proteins.
The team behind Diamond says the research will lead to breakthroughs in the fields of biotechnology, medicine, environment and materials science.
Professor Trevor Rayment, a physical chemist from Birmingham University and chair of the user forum at Diamond, says he is very excited about the new facility.
"I think Diamond will impact on the whole of the UK’s science and technology base – from oil rigs through to things as important as chocolate: chocolate tastes as good as it does because of its micro-structure, and one of the beamlines will be able to analyse the formation of chocolate in situ.
"I’m really looking forward to doing experiments here. Having this quality of facility in the UK is going to be great."
Comment: This a great local facility impacting upon the well being for all. Let us hope that this Govt undoes the damage it has inflicted upon the schools in derilicting its principal responsibility to encourage more pupils to take up and more competent teachers to teach The Three Rs and science subjects. Without that we’ll have to import scientists just like we have to import doctors, nurses, artisans.
Filed under Health and wellness
Is The small island state of Vanuatu the happiest place on Earth?
Happiness in the Pacific: The small island state of Vanuatu
Comment: Not according to me. Such a place is within an unrelenting truly life-long friend – size of your fist – your heart and that sized about two fists – your mind.
Filed under Health and wellness
Anant M Vyas 