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Austerity Kills People

droodzilla

pfm Member
Last week I had the misfortune to switch over to Question Time at precisely this moment:


Briefly, Guardian journalist claims disabled people are being condemned to death by this Government's benefits regime, and is shouted down by an impassioned "member of the public" (who, it turns out is a Tory - formerly UKIP - councillor). The episode reminded me why I stopped watching QT and I turned the TV off.

The serious question remains: does austerity kills people? The question is crudely put and deliberately provocative but the idea behind it deserves to be taken seriously, as this recent BMJ study shows:

http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/bmjopen/7/11/e017722.full.pdf

Shouty summary from The Independent here:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/h...e-social-care-government-policy-a8057306.html

The suggestion is that NHS and Social Care funding decisions since 2010 have resulted in around 45000 additional deaths (compared with the pre-2010 trend) between 2010 and 2014. If this continues, the number of additional deaths between 2015 and 2020 1ill be around 150,000. The cost of closing this mortality gap between now and 2020 is estimated to be between £4b and £5b per year, depending on what assumptions are made about efficiency savings. The official response from the DoH is, essentially, that correlation does not imply causation but one hopes that isn't their final word on the matter and that they are trying to determine the causes of the mortality gap.

Both subjects are close to my heart: I have a disabled partner who suffers the debilitating effects of the benefit system, and I believe my dad may have died as an indirect result of cost savings to the local ambulance service. Similar arguments were rehearsed following the Grenfell Tower disaster and I note that The Labour Party is pushing for funding in next week's budget to fit sprinklers in all high-rise blocks.

So, what are your thoughts? Chairman Mao is (rightly) condemned for the part his economic policies played in the great famine in China. Is austerity simply a less extreme example of the same thing? Should government ministers be held accountable for predictable adverse consequences (including preventable deaths) of their policies?
 
Yes. Of course it does. There are 3 classes of sick or infirm people in the world:
(a) those who will die regardless of what they get.
(b) those who may survive or not depending upon the quality of care, their housing, social circumstances, etc.
(c) those who will survive regardless because they are tough, resourceful and/or have the means to buy their way out of trouble, be cared for by wealthy friends or relatives, etc.

You can discount groups a and c. Those outcomes are determined regardless. What you do next determines who lives or dies in Group B, and whether some of them slide into Group A or C. Do more, better chance of some surviving, though some (Group A) will die whatever you do, as discusssed above. Do less, better chance of them dying. How much you are prepared to pay for - you choose. No right and wrong answer, and some are going to die anyway. Spend money on healthcare at the expense of housing, some will die because they have crap housing. Spend on housing and neglect other areas, some will die because you have lowered spend elsewhere, in spite of now having nice housing. You choose.
 
yes , my disabled friend who i recently spent months renovating her house had her pip stopped and has to wait 21 weeks for appeal . this person has a cerebral problem and wobbles all over the place . they are crazy , these pip people .
 
Poor housing contributes to a shorter expected lifetime. And a reduction in height, presumably due to bad infant nutrition.
 
There were Tory MPs suggesting that the downturn about to come from hard Brexit would toughen up the low income snowflakes, giving them a taste of the real world with the welfare state shrunk down, deregulation in the work place and a sink or swim attitude toward them from government. It's repugnant - the same hardliners are the ones with offshore cash and an eye for making a killing from the disruption. The fake New Labour veneer put on the nasty party by Cameron has fallen off with his departure. The Legatum handmaidens want control now.
 
Masses of anecdotal evidence from emergency services (incl. police, ambulance) that an increasing number of people are struggling to simply feed themselves and stay warm, never mind healthy.
 
maybe I'll have to become rich and hope I'm one of the lucky ones then.. :)
The idea that you can become wealthy if you work hard enough is a sop. Most really wealthy individuals inherited their money and, beyond a certain level, wealth begets wealth (how many ordinary working people can access offshore tax havens). Still, if enough plebs believe they can get rich if they try hard enough, they won't rock the boat.
 
Yes. Of course it does. There are 3 classes of sick or infirm people in the world:
(a) those who will die regardless of what they get.
(b) those who may survive or not depending upon the quality of care, their housing, social circumstances, etc.
(c) those who will survive regardless because they are tough, resourceful and/or have the means to buy their way out of trouble, be cared for by wealthy friends or relatives, etc.

You've left out those who recovered quickly because they took care of their health by not overeating or smoking 20 fags a day and made a point of doing regular exercise.
 
It's "poorism". Hatred of the poor because they're poor by those in government and society who consider poverty to be something that is chosen: "Workshy" and "shirkers" being just two of the terms they like to use to describe those of us who, for whatever reason, don't "succeed" in life. It's actually rampant Darwinism seized upon by selfish psychopathic primitives who use it as justification for their "dog eat dog" world view where life is a struggle in which only the "strong" survive. Its victims therefore, because this is "nature" at work, don't deserve any help.
 
The idea that you can become wealthy if you work hard enough is a sop. Most really wealthy individuals inherited their money and, beyond a certain level, wealth begets wealth (how many ordinary working people can access offshore tax havens). Still, if enough plebs believe they can get rich if they try hard enough, they won't rock the boat.

maybe my use of a smiley isn't getting through to people... but i was jesting of course, as steve67 implied that fewer rich people are dying... :)
 
The serious question remains: does austerity kills people?

The answer must be that it does, but why was austerity needed ?

What is needed is competent, long-term government, but this does not seem to exist - less so in the UK now than ever in my lifetime - whatever your political leaning (mine is Green & has been since I became an early subscriber to The Ecologist circa 1972).
 


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