Finally, the NHS says sorry

THE NHS this week finally apologised to the victims of the blood contamination scandal of the Seventies and eighties that infected up to 30,000 people with HIv or hepatitis, and resulted in at least 3,000 deaths.

It was one of the lowest points in the health service’s 70-year history, and that ‘sorry’ has been a long time coming.

Why is it such a hard word for the NHS to say? It’s a subject that many of you have written to me about after experiencing poor treatment or service.

If you complain, you are stonewalled because NHS management is so heavily under the influence of lawyers who veto any admission of culpability.

Yet it’s this attitude that can provoke people to take legal action. Time and again, people have told me that if only someone had acknowledged a failing and apologised, they’d have felt able to let it go.

Sorry is one of the most powerful words in the language: it can calm and console. Managers and clinical staff should use it more.