The NHS problem is not a funding one. It has been adequately funded for 20 years, and overall funding is above the OECD average. As shown in the chart below, state funding per capita is similar to that of similarly developed countries.
The big problem is obviously demand. The increase in demand has by far outpaced any feasible funding increases, and will continue to do so. As a nation we are too old, too fat, too drunk and too stationary - based on our current physical state, an increase in funding sufficient enough to solve the crisis would result in our health spending being so high that an impartial observer watching from outer space would have to conclude that our labour force is nothing more than a slave unit whose primary purpose is to serve an ageing/sick population. Once we start being honest and admit to ourselves that the bulk of the NHS crisis can be attributed to demand and not funding, we can start to seriously look at solutions. For example:
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We need to end the madness of our medical research being focused so strongly on extending the life of the elderly rather than improving the health of the young. In fact, the extension of life past current life expectancies should start to be looked upon as a moral wrong. This is obviously a global issue and not a domestic one.
- Leading healthy lifestyles should be looked upon not just as a service to the individual, but a duty to the wider nation.
Likewise, unhealthy lifestyles should merit greater social disgust.
Away from demand, the next big issue that I can see is management. We need to look at re-centralising the NHS. Scrap healthcare devolution to the Welsh/Scottish/NI assemblies and return them to the management of competent civil servants and ministers who are properly accountable. I'm not very clued up on the NHS in Scotland and NI, but in Wales the NHS is in such a bad state that the UK government should have intervened years ago. As for England, re-centralisation will put an end to the corruption and incompetence of overpaid local trust CEOs and directors. Also, re-negotiate GP contracts - have GP surgeries be run fully as public institutions rather than as quasi-private companies where surgeries act for their own benefit rather than for the benefit of the wider NHS.