Posted on 03/14/2020 7:58:46 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
Private hospital beds should be made available to treat people with coronavirus, Labour and the GMB union have demanded.
They say there are around 8,000 beds in at least 570 private sector hospitals in the UK.
The call comes as Labour and the GMB say the NHS is now expected to "deal with a national health emergency despite being under strain from years of privatisation and cuts".
GMB general secretary Tim Roache said: "The prime minister says this is 'the worst public health crisis for a generation' - well he needs to start acting like it.
"It can't be right that we have plush private hospitals lying empty waiting for the wealthy to fall ill, while people are left in dying in hospitals for the want of a bed.
"Do the right thing and let these unused beds be requisitioned by the NHS to save lives."
Supporting GMB's call, shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said: "The government should leave no stone unturned when it comes to supporting our NHS and making sure it is best equipped to protect life throughout the COVID-19 outbreak.
"That's why we support GMB's calls to requisition private hospital beds and increase capacity to meet the rising demand.
"As the prime minster said, this is the worst public health crisis for a generation. It would be completely wrong for the government not to call on all the resources possible."
Meanwhile, a headteachers' union has called on the government to immediately halt all Ofsted inspections.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.sky.com ...
How can NHS take them "back" if they never belong to the socialists in the first place. That's like me "taking back" the money in your wallet. Very, very Newspeakish.
BNO Newsroom
@BNODesk
39m
BREAKING: UK reports 342 new cases of coronavirus and 10 new deaths, raising total to 1,140 cases and 21 dead
“We must use this opportunity to double or triple the number we euthanize! Death to anyone over 50!”
Mighty fancy words there. Could have saved some breath and just said “steal them”.
L
When you have shortage of bedd you can go one of three ways - ration by first come first served, ration by the highest bidder, or ration by some other criteria such as age. Italy has opted for age and the UK currently has bidder for the moment.
Instead of using existing hospital/beds, just commandeer some of those “ghost malls” that are languishing and waiting to be useful.
If China can build entire hospitals in a few weeks’ time, refitting malls should be easy enough.
Welcome to Socialism. And I'm sure there are folks on the Coronavirus thread that would agree with the author of the article.
We MUST eliminate private hospital beds! The risk of having a larger percentage of private hospital patients survive is unacceptable!!!Bring Out Your Dead
Post to me or FReep mail to be on/off the Bring Out Your Dead ping list.
The purpose of the “Bring Out Your Dead” ping list (formerly the “Ebola” ping list) is very early warning of emerging pandemics, as such it has a high false positive rate.
The false positive rate was 100%.
At some point we may well have a high mortality pandemic, and likely as not the “Bring Out Your Dead” threads will miss the beginning entirely.
*sigh* Such is life, and death...
If a quarantine saves just one child's or one old fart’s life, it's worth it.
I don’t care if half a million have it.
What isn’t the government’s to take isn’t the government’s to take.
Because it never ends back in the hands of the original owners.
Throwing around big numbers is a leftist scare tactic.
Not the right.
Though I have seen Utter Fear in the right during this thing and that speaks a lot to our future.
“I don’t care if half a million have it.”
—
You’ll have to tell them that.
Crises are the best times for governments to take things that don’t belong to them and never give them back/take over industries and make them government owned/pass immediate bills that pour billions into their pockets in the end.
I’m quite sure of the billions going towards the virus here, half of it will line someone’s pockets without them lifting a finger.
Forget it, Jake. It’s communists.
Not me. I would make all their hospitals private instead. As scuzzy as they are, the corporate types would probably be better at allocating bed space than the NHS.
Probably not one of these beds has a ventilator to go with it.
The beds are for elective operations on otherwise fairly healthy people.
The NHS is where the really sick get treated in the UK.
That’s right. Private hospitals in the UK simply aren’t equipped for emergencies or intensive care.
My guess is that the government will do a deal of some kind with BUPA and the other private providers for access to the beds: but the real crunch issue will be staffing, not bedspace.
So I would expect this simply to be replicated by a larger deal.
The real crunch issue is likely to be over staffing rather than bedspace.
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