AHC: Consequences of Abolishing the National Health Service

[Christian]

With the Health Service seemingly being the one institute every one in Britain loves, an idea that’s been running around in my head is, what if it was straight up abolishes? How long would the government last if they were to do that? Would people be rioting outside Westminster?

 

[AH Layard]

It depends what you mean by 'abolish' but assuming it's an end to free at the point of care funded through taxation and move to an insurance system then no government would be suicidal enough to do it. Even the ruling Conservatives have to be seen as staunchly pro-NHS, hence the regular announcements of funding injections every year. The pandemic has also strengthened public support for the NHS. Major reform would be hugely disruptive to the delivery of care. A more realistic scenario is probably some pressure for small charges for GP appointments and more contracting out (though they are not necessarily good ideas).

The major problem the NHS faces is gaps in its workforce which is increasingly affecting the quality of care and patient safety. Anecdotally just yesterday I had to take myself off dialysis at the hospital without the right equipment, because the nurse was called away for other patients. Waits at A&E and for GP appointments are far too long. The more real threat to the NHS is a increasingly substandard quality of care and more avoidable deaths.

 

[Christian]

This is more a thought scenario where the NHS is just gone outright. Ignoring the context behind it, I’m not interested in realism, but in the political and societal backlash of getting rid of such a beloved institute.

 

[Charles EP M.]

A government planning to do this is a government that's got to run for office on it if they want to pass it - they'd face rebellions in Commons, Lords upheaval, major protests, all the medical unions against them etc.

 

[Deleted member 1529]

I can see it happening if the UK goes into long-term economic decline by the late 20th century and the NHS is visibly less effective than Western European health services due to the British state simply not being able to afford to provide an equivalent level of care to them.

Not that far-fetched - by the 70s most of Western Europe outside of Iberia was richer than the UK. Even in 1990 Italy was substantially richer.

 

[rfmcdonald]

I can only imagine the NHS being ended if there was a clearly better substitute for it, frankly.

 

[Callan]

I strongly suspect that if the NHS was abolished whatever organisation ends up succeeding it would also be called the National Health Service because any government that tried to do this would have to present it as a big reform with a sense of continuity, not by actively reveling in killing sacred cows.

 

[Ricardolindo]

Thatcher didn't even want to privatize British Rail, let alone the NHS.