COLUMNIST

A LITTLE over 10 years ago the NHS saved my life. I was diagnosed with breast cancer and without our amazing NHS I wouldn’t be here today.

That’s when I decided to take action to protect our health service.

I entered politics to ensure our health service was properly resourced and remains free for the patient.

I was therefore delighted when I was appointed as Ukip’s Shadow Secretary for Health and Wellbeing.

I have worked tirelessly, over the last year, with the Welsh Government to improve our NHS; supporting policies which will bring benefits to patients and holding them to account for poor choices and bad decisions.

There have been some major improvements in the last 12 months.

We have seen better emergency responses to life-threatening 999 calls since the clinical model was introduced.

We have seen targets achieved in cancer care, a new cancer plan and new screening tests introduced.

We have also seen improvements made in waiting times for treatment and reductions in delayed transfers of care.

Our spending on health and social care now accounts for nearly half the Welsh budget and we spend more per head than they do in England.

Yet, we still have one of the lowest cancer survival rates in the western world, people struggle to get an appointment with their GP and still have far too many people waiting for more than half a day in accident and emergency departments.

Our health service is the victim of its own success, we are all, thankfully, living longer.

Our population is growing and its ageing. In the next 20 years the number of over 65s is set to skyrocket.

By 2040 there will be 48 people over the age of 65 for every 100 people of working age.

The population of Wales is projected to increase by 3.1% by 2024 and by 6.1% by 2039.

The pressure this will put on health and social care will be unprecedented and as we have seen in recent decades simply throwing money at the problem won’t solve it.

We have to get smarter about how we use the limited resources we have, get smarter about how we spend nearly £7bn pounds each year on health and social care.

Over the last several months a review team, headed by Dr Ruth Marks, have been looking at how we tackle these issues.

This independent parliamentary review is due to publish its interim findings tomorrow. Their report will aim to outline the difficulties facing the health and social care sector in the coming decades, suggest possible solutions but above all be a launchpad for a public debate on health and social care.

At the same time the Welsh Government has launched a three-month public conversation on proposals to improve the quality and governance of health and social care services. I urge anyone who cares about the future of health and social care in Wales to take part in the governments consultation, make your views clear to the Independent Parliamentary Review and lobby your elected representatives.

Let’s get a genuine public debate going about how we want our NHS to operate in future and make your views clear to those making the decisions.