NHS

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  • Created by: bea_damon
  • Created on: 13-05-17 08:51

NHS

Advantages

  • Spending on the NHS increased more slowly than under previous governments
  • The number of people with private health insurance increased from 500,000 in 1955 to 6.6 million in 1990

Disadvantages

  • Between 1980 and 1987, spending on the NHS rose by 60%
  • As a percentage of total government spending, spending on the NHS rose from 12% to 15% between 1979 and 1996
  • 1989 White Paper 'Working for Patients' called for the creation of an internal market where health authorities would purchase health services from hospital trusts. These trusts would be run by professional managers rather than doctors to ensure targets were met. The idea was that better providers would attract more demand from GPs and would be rewarded with higher funding. These measures were not introduced until after 1990 and did not deliver the cost savings Thatcher hoped
  • By 1996, 34 trusts were in debt - attempts to cut costs resulted in reduced quality of care for emergency patients - loss of 2% of beds
  • Spending on NHS managers rose from £25.7 million to £383.8 million
  • Only 1% of manual workers had private health insurance and the majority continued to depend on the NHS
  • Requirement to 'meet targets' led to demoralisation among many doctors

Evaluation

- Thatcher's preferred solution to the spiralling cost of the NHS would have been to remove tax funding and replace it with private health insurance - this would have been noticed by the public, the majority of whom approved of expert, free healthcare regardless of wealth or income- She wanted to slash inefficiency and cost and introduce an element of competition 

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