NHS cannot become a part-time service

WE have become accustomed to the daily death toll from coronavirus, mercifully much lower than at the peak of the pandemic. What we cannot yet know is the death toll from the response to the virus.

One of the most controversial decisions taken was to postpone cancer screenings and even surgeries. Since then, around 400,000 screenings have been cancelled and almost 1,000 more Scots have died at home from cancer than the average.

Now we learn that operations will be carried out at only 60 per cent of precoronavirus capacity for at least the next two years. As a result, 10,000 patients will likely not receive surgery. Scottish Labour health spokesman Monica Lennon calls these plans ‘wrong-headed’ and predicts ‘a tsunami of cancer deaths’. It is difficult to see how the outcome could be any other.

Cancer is Scotland’s biggest killer and reducing surgical capacity will be nothing short of a death sentence for some.

No one doubts the additional burdens Covid-19 has placed on the NHS but cutting life-saving operations so drastically for so long is a devastating measure that will cause even more anguish for those who already have a diagnosis or will receive one in the months to come.

Health Secretary Jeane Freeman must instruct health boards to come up with a better plan. Her record was unimpressive before Covid-19 hit but failing to reverse this proposal swiftly would be damning.

Denying surgery to thousands of patients suffering from a killer disease in one of the most advanced countries in the world is simply unacceptable The NHS is not a part-time health service and it must not be allowed to become one.