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Link to this page: https://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/1032/28794
From The Socialist newspaper, 6 March 2019
A&E 4-hour waiting targets scrapped - Save our NHS!
Health workers marching on the demo for the NHS, 4.3.17, photo Mary Finch (Click to enlarge)
NHS nurse
NHS England is backing a plan to scrap four-hour A&E waiting time targets 'within a year'.
The current target is for 95% of patients to be seen at A&E within four hours.
Ditching this will mean that many patients with so-called 'less serious' illnesses could be forced to wait for well over four hours - which is already a long time!
The government has previously talked about the idea and doctors warned that getting rid of the target would have a "near-catastrophic impact" on patient safety.
A&E staff have also expressed concerns about triaging - deciding the order in which patients are treated.
But, as I have seen in wards I have worked in, the current targets are already insufficient. Emergency units have not hit the target since July 2015 for example.
In Wales - where the target will not be scrapped - Maelor Hospital in Wrexham in January posted the worst waiting time for an accident and emergency unit in Wales on record. Only 49% of patients where seen in under four hours.
Instead of scrapping A&E targets we need a big increase in staff to meet patient demand.
We demand:
- Reverse all cuts and privatisation to guarantee the needed funds to meet targets and treat patients
- Urgently train more NHS staff to work in overstretched wards and hospitals
- Trade union action to ensure they are paid a real living wage
- Nationalise all the big companies leeching off the NHS, cancel the PFI 'debts'
- Run the NHS under democratic workers' control as a real public service
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The coronavirus crisis has laid bare the class character of society in numerous ways. It is making clear to many that it is the working class that keeps society running, not the CEOs of major corporations.
The results of austerity have been graphically demonstrated as public services strain to cope with the crisis.
The government has now ripped up its 'austerity' mantra and turned to policies that not long ago were denounced as socialist. But after the corona crisis, it will try to make the working class pay for it, by trying to claw back what has been given.
- The Socialist Party's material is more vital than ever, so we can continue to report from workers who are fighting for better health and safety measures, against layoffs, for adequate staffing levels, etc.
- When the health crisis subsides, we must be ready for the stormy events ahead and the need to arm workers' movements with a socialist programme - one which puts the health and needs of humanity before the profits of a few.
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In The Socialist 6 March 2019:
What we think
No retreats: Corbyn must stand firm against Blairites
Workplace news
News
Boot out failing Grayling and the other Tory wreckers
Solidarity with Chris Williamson
Trade union action to end low pay now!
A&E 4-hour waiting targets scrapped - Save our NHS!
International Women's Day 2019
A socialist programme to end women's oppression
International Women's Day 2019: End oppression with fight for socialism
Socialist history
Leon Trotsky's struggle against Stalinism
Socialist Party reports and campaigns
Southampton: Fight council cuts
Cuts must stop - boot the Tories out
Wildfires hit Europe - build for 15 March student climate strikes
Swansea: Labour council tries to dodge no-cuts protest
Hull: support for anti-cuts policies at Corbyn solidarity rally
Hundreds of Tamils protest against death-threat brigadier
Opinion
Women workers' militancy during the 'great unrest'
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