Searching for the right prescription for a healthier NHS

YOUR article telling us of the rising costs of healthcare should be a wake up call to the nation (The Yorkshire Post, August 16).

It represents a tsunami of debt about to engulf us and has its origins decades ago.

An interesting graph came my way a few months ago. It showed British productivity growth since 1948.

Listen to the “captains of industry” and they will say British productivity is poor.

This is a lie. It has grown on an annual average of about 3.8 per cent.

Next to productivity growth was another line showing average income.

Up to 1972 the two lines were almost together. As our nation got richer, that wealth was shared with the workforce.

After 1972 productivity growth continued, but incomes flatlined and even fell.

Since 1972, the generated wealth was no longer shared with the British workforce.

Where has that wealth gone?

From: Richard Godley, Meadowfields, Whitby.

I CANNOT but help to reflect that every single problem facing the NHS could be solved if it were not sacrificed on the unassailable and untouchable altar of the net £57m per day this country has to hand over to the bureaucrats of Brussels.

From: Nigel Boddy, Fife Road, Darlington.

THE top civil servants’ plan to reduce the number of beds in NHS hospitals in the hope of reducing the number of NHS patients has failed.

It is based on the fictional urban myth that the number of NHS hospital patients expands to fill the number of beds available for them.

For 15 years it has been the policy of top civil servants to  shut down local hospitals and make us use one big super hospital in a major town or city nearby.

The last Labour government was as much responsible for this as anyone, turning the people of towns like Stockton against their own neighbours in Hartlepool over the closure of A&E.

The current coalition carries on with the plan, even though it is a failure.

Do the top civil servants in London want to see us all using private facilities instead of NHS- run hospitals?

In Teesside, it is obvious  James Cook Hospital in Middlesbrough has had a  fortune spent on facilities,  while surrounding hospitals  are starved of funds and very  run down.