What I dread

I really dread getting seriously ill these days, given the huge crisis in the NHS. People are waiting hours for an ambulance, then maybe more hours outside a hospital waiting to be admitted, and maybe more hours still before getting any effective medical treatment.

If I have a heart attack or a stroke, I'm highly unlikely to get prompt medical attention, because of long waits for medical treatment. By the time an ambulance arrives I could either be dead or much more seriously ill.

Significant numbers of people are dying unnecessarily because of long waits for medical treatment. It's estimated that there were almost 300 deaths a week associated with long accident and emergency waits in 2023.

Neither the British government or the Northern Irish government show any sense of urgency in getting the NHS back to its former high standards, the standards that were once seen as the envy of the world. Now the healthcare systems of many other countries are seen as better than the NHS.

We oldies and our multiple medical issues are often blamed for the parlous state of the NHS, but of course that's nonsense. The problem is a much more general one - lack of staff, lack of money, lack of up-to-date equipment, lack of efficient organisation.

More and more people are resorting to private healthcare as the NHS fails them. People who've been waiting absurd lengths of time for surgery, scans, physiotherapy or other procedures, people who've been in agonising pain for months or even years, are having to fall back on private provision to get the immediate attention they need. But of course many people simply can't afford to go private, they just don't have the spare cash.

And the situation isn't going to improve any time soon.

So far to go

Medicine has come a long way in protecting our health and well-being and extending our lives. It has given us vaccines, antibiotics, keyhole surgery, heart by-passes and all sorts of new treatments that didn't exist in previous centuries.

But there's much further to go. There are still many debilitating physical ailments that cause pain and distress to millions. There are still medical conditions that are a total mystery after many years of research.

I wonder what medical advances we will have made in 100 years' time? Or 200 or 300? Won't it be great when:

• We have joints that never wear out but can rejuvenate themselves.
• We have effective painkillers for every type of pain, however severe.
• We have no drop in energy levels as we age.
• We have a pill that dissolves all unwanted fat.
• We get older without looking old. So we always look like a twenty something.
• We have a cure for cancer.
• We have perfect photographic memories.
• We can reverse short-sightedness and long-sightedness.
• We can sleep soundly for eight hours every night.
• We all have huge IQs.

Of course we of the 2020s will all be gone by then so we won't be able to enjoy the onward march of medical skill. And just as we often take for granted the advances of the last few centuries, so the children of the future will take tomorrow's medical miracles for granted and have no idea that people were once in constant pain or needing replacement hips and knees.

Personally I'd love to have perfect eyesight without the need for glasses. And I'd love to have a perfect memory without the constant fumbling for recollection. One day it will be possible. But I'll be a long-scattered pile of ash before that day arrives.

A nurse's story

When I was in hospital for my prostate operation in 2017, I was aware of how busy the nurses were, scurrying from one patient to another checking their vital signs, keeping an eye on whatever equipment they were plugged into, giving them help of one kind or another. But I didn't know the half of it.

A book by the former nurse Christie Watson* reveals the reality of a nurse's job and just how demanding and meticulous and scary and messy it can be. I can only admire those resilient souls who take on such a difficult job and do it so well.

• They have to clean up shit, piss, vomit, diarrhoea, blood and all sorts of foul liquids that a sick patient produces.
• They have to give patients the right medicine, at the right dosage, in the right way, at the right time. One tiny slip can lead to a major emergency or even death.
• They may work very long shifts (often night shifts) of 12 hours or more with barely time to eat or use the toilet, such is the relentless pressure.
• They have to be familiar with hundreds of common or less common medical conditions and how each is treated.
• They need to be alert to the smallest change in a patient's condition that means urgent action is needed.

It's not a job for dawdlers or the faint-hearted. They do it for the satisfaction of helping very sick people become fit and healthy again, and seeing pain and terror and misery replaced by smiling, grateful faces. They want to do a job that really means something, not just a pen-pushing office job.

Quite a few nurses don't last the course. Sooner or late they realise they're not up to the unremitting demands and responsibilities of the job and they quit.

Jenny was a nurse for a while. My sister Heather was a nurse for a while. My niece Lucy has just qualified as a Registered Nurse and I applaud her for it. I think of all the pain and suffering she will relieve and the many hundreds of lives she will save.

*The Language of Kindness: A Nurse's Story by Christie Watson

Thanks for the memory

Homeopathic remedies are getting a lot of stick at the moment. Critics are saying they're totally useless and have no active ingredients except water.

A few days ago some Merseysiders organised a mass overdose of homeopathic medicines to prove they were ineffective and no harm would result. Others have pointed out that there isn't a single molecule of anything beneficial in the remedies, only the supposed "memory" of the molecule.

I've never taken a homeopathic potion in my life, but they're lauded by many public figures including the Royal Family. They can be found in chain stores like Boots and they're available on the NHS.

They've become so respectable that the wave of criticism is not having much effect, even though it's pretty unanswerable. If you were offered a cancer remedy with nothing but the alleged "memory" of an active ingredient, would you be rushing to get it? I doubt it.

A lot of people like the idea of it being a "natural" remedy as opposed to some dubiously potent artificial drug. But homeopathic medicines are also artificial since they're manufactured. They're not something you can pick in the garden or gather on the beach. The "natural" is a misnomer.

I've known homeopathic doctors who stoutly defended their methods. I've known lots of individuals who swear homeopathic remedies cured them of some serious ailment. But the scientific evidence flatly contradicts them. Are we seriously to believe in some mysterious magic process that can't be identified by scientists? That way madness lies.

If Her Majesty wants to take memory-imbued water, good luck to her. I shall save my cash for something with more medical credentials than the modern equivalent of snake oil.

PS: Many patients at the Royal London Homeopathic Hospital swear by homeopathic remedies and say they have helped with conditions that didn't respond to conventional treatment. My mind is not closed on the subject!

Unhealthy ravings

American Republicans out to sabotage President Obama's health reforms are spreading the most absurd lies and smears about the UK's National Health Service.

Their vicious campaign to portray Obama as a Nazi claims that his reforms are based on the NHS, a supposedly inhuman, uncaring organisation that writes off human lives.

According to them, it denies treatment to the elderly or anyone who's not "cost-effective", it has "death panels" that decide if people should live or not, it has endless waiting lists and expensive treatments are rationed.

This grotesque parody would be totally unrecognisable to most users of the NHS. They would be utterly bewildered by such a deranged travesty of a service that by and large works remarkably well and gives effective medical treatment to everyone and anyone.

I'm well aware of the NHS's flaws and failings, but the fact is that these flaws are trivial compared to its massive achievements. Far from writing off human lives, in general it goes to extraordinary lengths and spends extraordinary sums to relieve people's illnesses and maintain their quality of life.

The Republicans are not only telling breathtaking lies to prevent American citizens getting proper health care, they're insulting Britain and the million-plus NHS staff who are dedicated to their patients' well-being.

Yes, there are waiting lists for some high-demand procedures. Yes, a few expensive treatments are denied because they're of doubtful value. But anyone who needs urgent, life-or-death assistance gets it immediately with no questions asked and no expense spared - whether they're nine or ninety-nine.

Those in favour of Obama's health reforms should not imagine for one moment that the Republicans' deluded ravings are in any way based in reality.

They're just the desperate flailings of those who still want medicine to be the preserve of the rich, while the poor suffer and die helplessly.

PS: I read that the Twitter campaign #WeLoveTheNHS now has over a million followers

PPS: See Barack Obama's new webpage on the health reforms "Setting the record straight"