How a Trump trade deal would kill off our NHS
EXPOSED: Horrifying cost of drugs in a post-Brexit U.S pact
A TRADE agreement with the US after a no-deal Brexit could be fatal for the NHS, campaigners warn.
It may mean the NHS being forced to pay hugely inflated prices for drugs and operations.
Activist Diarmaid McDonald said: “US demands could push the NHS towards bankruptcy.”
A NO-deal Brexit could leave Britain at the mercy of US healthcare predators.
Powerful American corporations are eyeing up the NHS and want to put an end to the health service keeping its costs down.
Leaving the EU without a deal would make the UK heavily reliant on a trade agreement with the US.
Campaigners say this desperation would put us in such a weak position we would have to make major concessions.
And the NHS, which spends £140billion annually, is the prize the US companies want.
Health campaigner Diarmaid McDonald said: “The demands of the US could take a wrecking ball to the NHS budget, pushing it to the edge of bankruptcy and putting the lives of patients across the UK at risk.”
The Office of the US Trade Representative has published a summary of objectives for US-UK trade negotiations after Brexit.
US pharmaceutical firms, known as Big Pharma, want “full market access for US products” and say mechanisms keeping NHS drug prices low are “unreasonable”.
UPROAR
Without these price controls the cash-strapped NHS could be paying hugely inflated American costs – up to six times more for operations and over 20 times more for some medication.
Acid reflux drug Nexium costs 66p per pill in the UK – and £7.40 in the US.
A hip replacement there is as much as £37,000. The same surgery costs the NHS around £7,500.
Fearing bad publicity, Boris Johnson this week told ministers they must not discuss the NHS in any trade deal with the US.
But critics say his words should be taken with a pinch of salt.
His previous promises include “lying down in front of bulldozers” to stop a third runway at Heathrow, but when the issue got to the Commons he went on a diplomatic visit abroad to avoid voting against the Government.
On his state visit in June, Donald Trump said the NHS was “on the table” in US-UK negotiations, but he later rowed back on the comment after public uproar.
His US Ambassador to the UK, billionaire Woody Johnson also said the NHS would be fair game in trade negotiations.
Dr Tony O’Sullivan, co-chair of campaign group Keep Our NHS Public, said: “The verbal assur
ances from Johnson that the NHS won’t be in trade deals are nothing more than hot air.
“We’ve had false assurances that the Government isn’t privatising the NHS when it is already.
“A trade deal with the US would be the death knell of the NHS and would nail down the market in the NHS for ever.
“We demand total assurance the legislation will be changed and we will re-nationalise the NHS.”
More than 700,000 people have so far signed a petition demanding the Government guarantees the NHS will never form part of a trade deal with the US.
Big Pharma, worth £1.3trillion annually to the US economy, is said to be the most profitable
industry in the world. It has one of the most powerful lobby machines in Washington, with Trump and his top staff rubbing shoulders with the big bosses.
More 90% of Americans have health insurance – leaving around 28 million who are uninsured.
The average premium paid by Americans is £360 a month.
Mr McDonald, founder of pressure group Just Treatment, said: “There are people in the US who are dying because they can’t afford their medicines and their health system can’t provide them access.
“Young people are dying when they drop off their parents’ insurance as they can’t afford insulin.
“That’s one example of the kind of crisis we risk facing in the UK if
we are left with the same kinds of unregulated drug prices they have in the US.
“The US wants to strip back controls that keep our drug prices ‘reasonable’... They want NHS drug costs to rocket.
“We risk a situation where the drug companies have more ability to demand high prices and our NHS has got less power to resist.
“We’ll be forced to pay prices which suck money from the NHS to put it into the pockets of multibillion dollar US companies.”
The buying power of the NHS, which deals with more than a million patients every 36 hours, means it can negotiate cheaper deals. The indicative NHS cost per pill of Daraprim is £2.30, compared