Medical establishment joins together against harmful NHS charging policy

Following a string of media reports revealing the harm caused by NHS charging to Doctors of the World patients and others, the Royal College of Physicians (RCP), Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH), the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) and the Faculty of Public Health (FPH) have today joined together to call for a suspension of the charging regulations pending an independent review.   In doing so, they’ve joined other voices, including the British Medical Association Council Chair, Dr Chaand Nagpaul and Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary, Jonathan Ashworth, who have recently come out against the charging policy in the face of growing evidence of dangerous and discriminatory practices in NHS hospitals.   Since October 2017, NHS hospitals in England are legally required to check all patients’ eligibility to free NHS care and issue inflated upfront charges to those unable to prove eligibility. For those unable to pay in full in advance, treatment can be withheld.   Even though urgent care should always be provided (but billed for later), Doctors of the World UK has dealt with a number of cases of patients’ urgent care being wrongfully delayed or denied. Indeed, research at our clinic showed that one in five patients are affected by healthcare charging and, of those, one in three deterred from seeking timely healthcare.   Examples include a woman with breast cancer who was refused a mammogram at a London hospital...
Source: Doctors of the World News - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Tags: Uncategorised Source Type: news