Why preventing long-term sickness in the UK is an economic necessity
Why preventing long-term sickness in the UK is an economic necessity
With extended life expectancy Britain has wound up an increasingly sick nation – and experts say that this is as bad for GDP as it is for our health
Active travel should be a key part of this. People need to switch from driving to walking and cycling.
Fewer cars on the road will also improve air quality in cities.
I get what you mean but I find anti car rhetoric way too overdone.
Given the topic is about health issues there's going to be a lot of people who have limited mobility so cycling isn't viable and walking may only be short distances. Therefore a car provides them freedom they need.
I agree cars are indispensable in certain cases but that shouldn't detract from the need to reduce journeys by car. In London 1 in 3 schools are close to roads with illegal levels of N02 pollution. Improving air quality is critical to preventing damage to young lungs as well as improving road safety.
That's where a good bus network would help and infrastructure built less around cars would make shorter distances more likely for other means like cycling/walking.
Does nobody else find the framing of this article a little weird? I thought the argument for boosting the economy, was because it correlated well with people's well being. (Not that I personally but that, but I understand the line of thought). Now instead we're suggesting that human outcomes are important because it boosts an arbitrary measure? I feel like the cart is now dragging the horse along the ground.
Well duh. We definitely need a much stronger focus on public health and primary care rather than leaving problems on waiting lists until they are harder (and more expensive) to solve.
Nah, if you leave people on waiting lists they give up, turn to private options or just die, so it's no longer your problem. That's the cost saving approach the NHS uses for mental health services.
Great aim but I don't see what this Labour government is going to do to make the situation better given the last government couldn't nor could the last Labour government for that matter.
We've gone from it being worse in work than out on benefits, to Universal Credit, to being stigmatised for being long term ill such that why would you bother.
Harder choices than what we're prepared for are needed. Good luck to them 👍.
The last Labour government
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had an NHS waiting list that was in the region of hours, not weeks.
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over doubled NHS funding
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presided over the NHS having it's fastest increase in spending in its history
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built a shitload of new NHS facilities and expanded capacity
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had NHS staff that were paid way more fairly and didn't experience the extreme burnout we're seeing now
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massively improved NHS dentistry
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presided over the highest NHS satisfaction rating in its history
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had what the WHO and others cited as being the best overall healthcare system on the planet
I'm not saying it was perfect. The IT system overhaul was a bit of a flop, for example. But Labour left the NHS in the best state it has ever been in.
I don't see how you could look at Labour and the Conservatives on health and say "both parties are the same"
I don't see how you could look at Labour and the Conservatives on health and say "both parties are the same"
But did I say that? Did I really? That seems like a misunderstanding of what I said.
The last Labour government did a lot of good in the NHS. Correct. 👍.
Specifically on long term sickness and getting people back to work, however, I don't recall them having solved the issues. In fact there was a lot of news about people being better off out of work rather than in work. Hence the Tory attempt at UC to give people "purpose". That was the whole thing with Ian Duncan Smith, he didn't see how paying people to stay at home long term sick was better for them than giving them work opportunities.
So whilst I agree Labour and Conservative records are vastly different, neither have solved the issues of long term sickness have they?
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