Health Secretary:"People who are abusing NHS staff can be turned away, and should be turned away, if that is the way that they are treating our staff"

[deema]

Where was your compassion when the Tories proposed building a giant wave machine in the channel? Personally, I think Wes Streeting has a big mouth, and common sense will probably prevail.

Why would you start this thread in a woodworking forum anyway? Bored? Still fuming that Labour won?
And yes, I admit I react to this sort of hyperbole, when I should know better, but I've got better things to do than start such provocative threads.

The last time I looked, it’s only the left that advocate the death penalty for holding a particular view. Let’s not forget, the lefts hero Putin invaded Ukraine on the premise he was putting down a far right government……hmm….far right, does that not ring an alarm bell with the rhetoric we are being asked to digest at the moment and the rational used for withholding life saving treatment from the ‘undesirables’?

 

[John Brown]

Butterfly effect.
A politician flaps his mouth somewhere, causing a storm in a teacup.

 

[Richard_C]

The NHS does a remarkable job. It treats the people that come to it regardless of their personal choices. Your GP will continue to treat your lung disease even if you continue smoking after 20 years of advice not to, the hospital will treat your joint problems even if you are unfit and overweight, A&E will deal with the aftermath of a car crash and proritise according to medicl urgency, they won't fail the drunk driver who caused it - that's a matter for the police and courts later. It will deliver your child, regardless of your wealth or lifestyle, and treat that baby according to its needs. They will try to save the sight or finger of a woodworker even though they should have worn PPE. They don't judge. Thank you, NHS.

Look at the other side of the coin. Think about the 2 Phillippino nurses on their way to work in a hospital who's taxi was stoned by rioters . Think about the men (and it is mostly men) who hold wooden staves in their hands and chant migrants out, who spew hate at anyone who doesn't look like them. No one should face abuse like that, no triage nurse should face a patient who tells them to "get me a white nurse you xxxxx xxxxx". (It happens). They deserve respect and they deserve protection.

Then think long term and perhaps selfishly. Our heath service and social care depends on people who were not born here. Remove them, what do we have? Half a service at best. What do we stop doing - stop care homes? stop hospital admissions? close GP surgeries?. You can t have it all. Perhaps read the piece in today's Guardian, an Egyptian born doctor on his way to full citizenship describing the fear that he and his colleagues have now, and wondering if he wants to stay in the UK. Healtcare professionals have choices, not least which country they live in. If many choose to go elsewhere, we all face grim consequances.

Wes Streeting has made an important statement - no NHS worker should face racial abuse. The meta message is to those workers: we want you, please stay. It was nuanced - far from the sensationalist account that Deema used to start this thread. Whether that was deliberate misdirection or simply being too lazy to read and think about the whole article we shall never know, but we have seen the real consequences of half truths and fake claims promoted on social media. It's easy to write a headline, easy to pick holes, easy to start an argument, much harder to find solutions.

As a country we do need a debate about how we protect public service workers from physical and verbal abuse, but sound-bite claims based on half-truths get us nowhere.

 

[deema]

@Richard C we have a justice system, police, and courts to deal with transgressions of the law. We presume innocence until found guilty. As a citizen we are not allowed to take the law into our own hands and dole out justice as we see fit. These are all the hallmarks of a civilised society. What we don’t have and should never condone, is arbitrary decisions made about someone who is allegedly racist being denied what could be life saving treatment. If we want mob rule, a breakdown of society and law and order, we go down the health secretary’s well thought through policy of denying health care to anyone deemed to be racist.

Now, let’s look at the other point you make that NHS staff shouldn’t face racist behaviour. Well, that’s true, and neither should anyone in society, so do we extend the rule for the NHS to every aspect of society? What makes NHS staff so special? What about dentists, Care workers, police, fire brigade, pharmacists, and our three armed forces? Are they not vital, worthy of being kept safe? What about shop workers, civil servants and politicians? Are they further down the food chain? Or indeed you and me? Don’t we deserve the same protection, or are we somehow less important, not as worthy?

What about murder, rapists, sexual molesters, terrorists, should we not treat them for a medical condition? Or are these crimes somehow more trivial than some form of racial slur?

 

[MikeJhn]

I was recently accused of abusing NHS nurse, because I was forceful in taking the head nurse to task in the Oncology department for having all the fire doors in her department propped open, she could not see the danger she was causing and insisted the doors needed to be propped open because the rooms had no windows, I was accused by the staff nurse of abuse and she would not have her staff talked too in that way, she was not present and did not hear me take the nurse to task, IMO I was not rude or abusive, just forceful, I contacted and informed the hospital fire officer who thanked me for informing him, the next time I was in the Oncology department the head nurse of that department confronted me with "You got me into trouble" obviously not a lessoned learnt.

 

[deema]

We have seen people and organisations being debanked because of their political perspective, arbitrary destruction of people and company’s being able to operate in society because banking is now a key service. That’s intolerable, and now we are seeing for calls that health care is also only available to those with the ‘correct’ political views.

 

[selectortone]

now we are seeing for calls that health care is also only available to those with the ‘correct’ political views.

Oh good grief. That is one hell of a stretch.

 

[MikeJhn]

I remember about ten years ago (or was it more) a move to withhold NHS service's to people who smoked what ever happened to that I wonder.

 

[John Brown]

I was recently accused of abusing NHS nurse, because I was forceful in taking the head nurse to task in the Oncology department for having all the fire doors in her department propped open, she could not see the danger she was causing and insisted the doors needed to be propped open because the rooms had no windows, I was accused by the staff nurse of abuse and she would not have her staff talked too in that way, she was not present and did not hear me take the nurse to task, IMO I was not rude or abusive, just forceful, I contacted and informed the hospital fire officer who thanked me for informing him, the next time I was in the Oncology department the head nurse of that department confronted me with "You got me into trouble" obviously not a lessoned learnt.

Did they refuse to treat you, or execute you by firing squad?

 

[MikeJhn]

I was recently accused of abusing NHS nurse, because I was forceful in taking the head nurse to task in the Oncology department for having all the fire doors in her department propped open, she could not see the danger she was causing and insisted the doors needed to be propped open because the rooms had no windows, I was accused by the staff nurse of abuse and she would not have her staff talked too in that way, she was not present and did not hear me take the nurse to task, IMO I was not rude or abusive, just forceful, I contacted and informed the hospital fire officer who thanked me for informing him, the next time I was in the Oncology department the head nurse of that department confronted me with "You got me into trouble" obviously not a lessoned learnt.

Incidentally I had thirty five visits to the Oncology department in a seven week period and have nothing but high praise for the staff in that department for the care and treatment I received.

 

[John Brown]

I remember about ten years ago (or was it more) a move to withhold NHS service's to people who smoked what ever happened to that I wonder.

Maybe somebody worked out that smokers died earlier, balancing out some of the perceived strain on the system, or maybe it was pointed out that the same argument could apply to rock climbers, skiers, people without SawStop(TM) or the obese, all of whom could be said to put themselves at unnecessary risk.

 

[MikeJhn]

Did they refuse to treat you, or execute you by firing squad?

Bolted down to the bed and laying in a Halcyon machine feels like an execution, I don't recommend it.

 

[deema]

Maybe somebody worked out that smokers died earlier, balancing out some of the perceived strain on the system, or maybe it was pointed out that the same argument could apply to rock climbers, skiers, people without SawStop(TM) or the obese, all of whom could be said to put themselves at unnecessary risk.

And people with a different political view point. We both agree, it shouldn’t happen if he allowed to happen.

 

[Blackswanwood]

We have seen people and organisations being debanked because of their political perspective, arbitrary destruction of people and company’s being able to operate in society because banking is now a key service. That’s intolerable, and now we are seeing for calls that health care is also only available to those with the ‘correct’ political views.

We saw one instance of that and heads (rightly) rolled. The “victim” quickly found alternative banking arrangements.

If however you are abusive or threatening to your bank they will close your accounts. Wes Streeting isn’t advocating anything beyond those who are abusive or threatening to NHS staff. It’s not a news worthy story (other than to make the feckless aware that their actions have consequences). If you Google it you’ll find it already happens and the guidance is simply being restated.

You do seem to have an ability to extrapolate something that is not really an issue into us facing the end of civilisation as we know it.

 

[Chris152]

The last time I looked, it’s only the left that advocate the death penalty for holding a particular view. Let’s not forget, the lefts hero Putin [and so on...]

It's not about holding a particular view, and it's not a 'death sentence' - it's about abusing someone on account of their race, who's there to help you and then to help others - so while someone is wasting the staff's time with their abuse, someone else is suffering, potentially dying. And where on earth did you get the Putin/ left's hero bit from?! Why not stop and have a little think about what you're writing?

 

[Richard_C]

Why not stop and have a little think about what you're writing?

Or even a very big think. A long think. A look in a mirror say it out loud think. A how you might sound to others think. A would I say it to his face think.

Imagine yourself in a chair in a TV studio, with Wes Streeting opposite you and an NHS doctor alongside. Somebody like Kirsty Wark introducing. "Now, Mr Deema, you said that the health secretary wants the death penalty for racists, how do you justify that claim?"

 

[deema]

@Richard C I would answer the question with the logic and extrapolation of the implications of his words in the same eloquent manner that I have present it within this thread.

If you withhold health care based on someone’s manner / political views you will on a number of instances be causing their death. There is no escaping that fact.

There are a number of conditions and drugs, both prescribed and illicit that affect peoples personality and levels of aggression.

Now, it’s a very simple choice, either you support the removal and right to medical care based on a persons political view or you don’t.

 

[selectortone]

If you withhold health care based on someone’s manner / political views you will on a number of instances be causing their death. There is no escaping that fact.

Not necessarily - racists can always go to an all-white hospital. Supremacists can go to a Nazi hospital. Good luck finding one though.

 

[Richard_C]

You conflate "political view" with "behaviour" to support a flawed argument. As so often the case on this forum (and elsewhere) people dig in to defend their initial position rather than listen and reflect. You belive Wes Streeting wanst to kill people, I don't. That's it. There is absolutely no point in continuing.

 

[deema]

Not necessarily - racists can always go to an all-white hospital. Supremacists can go to a Nazi hospital. Good luck finding one though.

I think you will be surprised, whites are the least racist. To suggest that whites are the only racist segment of society is one of THE most racist biased perspectives to hold. You wouldn’t qualify to receive any health care based on your support of such a policy and your clearly racist views.