On reading the news that the NHS is planning to launch a scheme next year which will reward people for taking exercise – to be precise, walking for 30 minutes a day – I’m afraid I made a very disrespectful noise.
The shortcomings of the National Health Service were exposed in recent headlines about the simple business of ensuring as many women as possible aren’t traumatised by having a so called “natural” birth imposed on them, with the higher mortality rate that has historically gone with it, making this nanny-knows-best babyfication of the adult population seem particularly inappropriate.
The “marathon a month” challenge aims to have people walking 26 miles in that time; the ubiquitous “smart phone” or “smart watch” will apparently be used to offer up yet more information to the authorities about the correctness of our behaviour.
Defenders of the scheme will doubtless point out that prevention is better than cure, and that encouraging people to take exercise now will save tax-payers a fortune in the future. But this prudence seems highly prejudiced and cheese-paring. The NHS wastes a huge amount of money, on everything from a vast bureaucracy (the world’s largest quango, NHS England, is widely believed to have contributed to the longest waiting times, lowest patient satisfaction and most expensive NHS in history) to the disposal of masses of single-use equipment, creating 156,000 tonnes of waste produced by the NHS every year in England alone.
Nobody wants to return to the days when hand-washing on the part of surgeons was thought to be wildly over-fastidious, but the mass disposal of, say, walking aids makes no sense, unless you have a fetish for licking them. Harmonic shears – surgical devices which seal patients’ wounds using ultrasound waves – cost more than £500, but 90 per cent are gaily chucked away after one use.
All this while basic hygiene is frequently neglected; anyone who has used an NHS ward toilet recently will raise an eyebrow at the idea that hospitals are sparklingly clean, sterile environments. Wes Streeting said it well: “Because the NHS deals in the billions, too often it doesn’t think about the millions. That has to change.”
But back to the pets-win-prizes plan. The BBC website seems in two minds about who will be paying the piper, reporting both that, “When it comes to funding, the NHS is covering the initial set‑up, but the wider plan is to draw in philanthropic backing from major corporates as the scheme rolls out”. “Health officials say the NHS will not be paying for the rewards. They say the NHS in England will be in partnership with other organisations from public and private sector who will run the scheme.” Call me suspicious-minded, but I’m not crazy about that “initial set-up” bit.
Individuals working for the NHS are the best people I’ve ever met, from the healthcare assistants I was cared for by during six months in hospital to the community nurses who have looked after me since I came out. But I find the way the organisation is led to be much less satisfactory.
The scheme is being developed in partnership with the Olympic medallist Sir Brendan Foster, who sounds a straightforward fellow, to be polite: “I’m known for running, but the ambition here is far simpler. We just want people to walk. Simple.”
But it’s not simple. What about my lame brethren, who simply cannot walk for half an hour a day? Those on crutches, walkers and in wheelchairs? Don’t we get a sugar-free biscuit and a pat on the head too? Shame! Still, at least the able-bodied are now getting a taste of how it feels to be patronised the way we cripples are.
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