Why are the services being threatened at the Alexandra hospital?

It would seem obvious that the Trust should focus on resolving the reasons why it is costing so much money to run and manage the PFI hospital in Worcestershire.

However, the PFI hospital is a flagship government project.

In addition the contracts have been signed with private companies, and these contracts run for many years. Contracts that the Trust cannot easily cancel or renegotiate.

If the Trust is to save money, the money must be saved from elsewhere from within the organisation. NHS services in the public sector will disproportionately suffer the worst of the cuts and the losses.

Even though the Worcester PFI hospital is losing a significant proportion of the Trusts money, savings will be made at other more finically viable hospitals such as the Alexandra hospital in Redditch.

The whole situation is preposterous. Keeping services that are more expensive to run at the PFI hospital, while cutting the services that are cheaper to run at NHS hospitals.

Surly any sensible government would step in and stop this from happening, would it not?

Choice

Lets make it absolutely clear. The very last thing that most patents want is choice. We don't want to have to choose from a poor local service or a good one 50 miles away!

Choice will lead to a two tear service. Those members of society that can afford to travel and who have easy access to a car and who can afford to take additional time off work will shop around to obtain the best service available. Those that are left, the "second class" citizens, will send up with what ever service is available locally, and will not have the same opportunities.

The vast majority of people simply want good local services.