A Recommendation Report for Nhs Funding ShortageEssay Preview: A Recommendation Report for Nhs Funding ShortageReport this essayModule Code:PM502Class/Group: Group 10Module Title: Skill for study (2)Assessment Title: Finally reportAssignment Title: NHSTutor Name: Kirsten SomervilleStudent GU IDDate of Submission: Sunday 24th March, 2019Word count :1594A recommendation report for NHS funding shortageExecutive summaryThe National Health Service (NHS) currently are facing unprecedented financial pressure. Facing a serious financial deficit, the government announced that they will increase 3.4% funding every year in the next 5 years. However, although the government increases the budget ratio, it does not meet the demand of patients because of the troubles such as population growth, ageing, morbidity changes etc. The report evaluates that funding source from government increase spending on social care, but it is not available and sufficient at the moment, it is recommended that NHS has to increase additional funding through recovery debts owned as much as possible, and reduce the possible spending of NHS daily expense to alleviate financial strains of NHS.
Contents:1.Introduction2.Background3.Solutionsa）Government increase spending on social care.b）Increase additional funding for the NHS.c）Reduce the possible spending of NHS daily expenses.4.Conclusions5.Recommendations6.Reference:1.IntroductionThe National Health Service (NHS) is a health care institution in UK, providing free medical services to residents living in the UK. Recently, there is a big problem on NHS funding. Funding for health services can seem overwhelming. The scale is enormous– the NHS spent almost £124 billion in 2017/18 in England which accounts 15% of the total public spending (The health foundation, 2017). As the increase of the ageing population, the growing number of patients, and plus the cuts to local authority funding, is placing enormous pressure on social health services (Select Committee on the Long-term Sustainability of the NHS, 2017). The shortage of social care services has brought unprecedented pressure to the NHS that is increasingly difficult to control (ibid). The patients medical cycle is prolonged, and many patients cannot receive timely treatment, the funding problem of NHS is eager to solve. According to Nuffieldtrust (2017), it points out that NHS trusts have carried out on 2017/18 in order to reduce fiscal deficit. The current basic overrun or loss is 5.9 billion pounds. In order to achieve their £500 million deficit target, they will need to cut £3.6 billion in operating costs and receive £1.8 billion in temporary additional funding (Nuffieldtrust ,2017). This report aim to evaluate several solutions to solve the problem of NHS funding shortage.
2.BackgroundThe NHS was born out of providing better medical services for everyone, regardless of wealth status (NHS England, 2016/2019). In addition to prescription drugs, optical services, and dental services, NHS still provides free medical care to UK residents (ibid). According to the statistics, the current population of the UK is over 64.6 million, and the population of England alone is 54.3 million (ibid). The NHS, which is the main source of funds through taxation, has recently been under tremendous pressure. The NHS in the UK needs to treat more than 1 million patients every 36 hours (NHS England, 2016/2019). If a series of requirements are to be met, the NHS will incur additional costs, including population growth, ageing, morbidity changes, and cost pressures associated with new technologies or compensation (Stoye, 2018), and insufficient funding has become a serious problem for the NHS. Until 2015/16, NHS Providers has showed, the financial deficit has escalated to approximately £4 billion (David, 2018). In addition, compared with the history of NHS, public consumption has experienced a substantial increase in health, from 3.5% in 1949-50 to 7.3% in 2016-17 (ibid). According to the figure 1 below, the NHS budget is increasing year by year over 10 years from 111.2 billion ponds in 2010 to 128 billion ponds in 2020. Since 2009-10, the NHS funds have been sufficient to deal with population pressure. However, this is only one third of the pressure (Stoye, 2018). According to the NHS provider, the deficit in the emergency hospital sector is about 4 billion pounds (David, 2018). The gap between resource and patient demand is nearly £30 billion until 2020/21 (ibid). However, divert funds from other aspects of public expenditure can only be a short-term policy and is not enough to sustain long-term funding problems, in particular, the increase in medical expenditures will be particularly difficult by reducing the share of payments for other services(ibid).
Figure 1: Annual NHS total expenditure and budgetSource: Department of Health annual report and accounts 2016/17; Autumn Budget 2017; Office for Budget Responsibility November 2017 Economic and fiscal outlook: Economy supplementary tables.
3.Solutionsa）Government increase spending on social care.According to the announcement of the prime minister on 5 July 2018, there is an average annual increase of 3.4% funding will provided to the NHS in the next five years (Gareth, 2018). However, the increases are lower than the funds required (4%) by the Kings Fund and other organizations to balance the NHS expenditures (Ham, 2018). People in the NHS are expected to obtain more funds for the scale of the operational and financial problem they are suffering (ibid). As taxation is the main source of NHS funds, one of the government’s practices is to divert money from other public areas expenditures to the NHS (Stoye, 2018). Figure 2 shows how government spending and public health spending have changed since 1979-1980, with the share of national income (ibid). Through cutting spending from other
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private sector spending on social care, the government’s total spending in 2015-16 increased to 27.6%; by 2016-17 the Government’s surplus to the NHS was 17.9%. The Government has also continued budget cuts and changes to social care, including a focus on child development support, health support payments and other services. This government also continues to reduce funding for hospitals. However they are reducing funding to the NHS and private sector, as more money is being created in the NHS because of a policy shift away from funding the NHS. As the Government continue to reduce funding, the NHS risks becoming a less efficient, less efficient, less efficient, more expensive, less efficacious and more cost effective service.1 We can make some progress by improving on the proposals by the previous government that have been approved as a result of the previous Finance Review. We need to address the problem and do the right thing. We can achieve a cost reduction that is as high as 3% with a much shorter waiting time in the NHS, at the most important place. We can stop making the NHS unaffordable for an aging population. We can improve quality and increase the financial security of patients. We can take a very effective and innovative approach to the NHS. We can strengthen a very good quality service system through our increased investments in community health services. We can take action to reverse the social insurance system under which individuals, families and employers are provided health coverage. We can increase patient trust and ensure that the NHS is run efficiently, by focusing on community development programmes. We can continue to increase investment in basic services rather than making all NHS services unaffordable. At the same time we can make some changes to the public sector and make more people more secure and connected by providing low and moderate pay for the provision of care. We can restore the trust in the NHS by implementing a social care service policy. We can stop giving the government a free ride in reducing the costs of the NHS. We can end the reliance of senior management in the NHS and reduce the government’s role as a mediator in the delivery of benefits. We can create a community-based quality public health service that provides a level playing field, as well as funding the key public health and social welfare services. We will also have a high-performing primary care system that ensures that people with particular qualifications can provide the care as they see fit (e.g. with quality NHS education and training). And we can invest more on the needs of working poor families. We must stop the cuts and to maintain continuity of services in order to restore service to poor people. I would like to turn to the recent report from the World Health Organization, which shows global economic activity, population, and poverty. This report, to be released later that day at the Conference on the Development of Independent Economies, can provide some of the insight into the recent trends in the growth of non-financial companies which are making significant investments in our business by investing in the development of their international assets. It shows that the sector has experienced a boom in the past 25 years, with the largest amounts of foreign money pouring into our business since 2000. We are now the seventh largest and fifth most profitable non-financial entity in the world, with our investment portfolio exceeding $4 trillion. Of the foreign investment in our activities, we have invested