Britain’s cancer bomb has detonated and the NHS is in denial
British cancer patients deserve so much better. If I had the choice to be diagnosed and treated in the four different countries analysed in striking new research – Australia, Canada and Norway would rank above Britain every single time.
We are behind all three countries in treating a variety of different cancer types, with their five-year survival rates also far superior. The brutal reality is that thousands and thousands of British cancer patients are dying unnecessarily, and many would still be alive had they been cared for in a different system. This study even used data from before the Covid debacle. The current situation is one of persistent treatment delays and a dramatic fall in the quality of care. It’s surely time to start asking why?
Outlining the crisis is part of the problem, but we need solutions. How can we fix Britain’s cancer crisis?
The first, and most important point, is to admit the problem. Eradicate the blasphemy culture surrounding the NHS and scrap the Stalinesque propaganda. If those leading the health service refuse to publicly accept that we have issues, what hope is there of actually solving it? NHS denial is killing cancer patients.
Unambitious targets should be scrapped, even if that would paint the system in a bad view. 62 days from urgent suspected cancer referral to the start of treatment? Appalling, and it’s routinely missed. Patients would sue in America, rightly so.
Boosting the workforce is central to everything. If we pay generous overtime, staff will work longer hours – overnight and at the weekend. We don’t have time to train more, we need to utilise our existing people. To do so, we have to make them feel valued. Free parking, childcare help, better pay and more. If we don’t, our brain drain to Australia and other more attractive destinations will continue.
We cannot in good faith continue to import thousands of healthcare staff from poorer countries who need their expertise far more than we do. I wonder if the Australians are saying the same about us.
There are other ways we can ease demand on staff and clear bottlenecks. Empowering NHS 111 to book scans and biopsies is essential, helping patients to bypass GPs when they would tick the same boxes. Lower the symptom threshold for 111 action, and put faith in the algorithms. It may not be perfect, yet, but easing pressure on primary care would solve far more problems than it solves.
Twinned with a concerted government effort to utilise existing capacity in the private sector, the vast waiting lists are there to be slashed. Independent health care providers are operating at roughly 50 per cent capacity, why on earth are we not taking advantage of that? These private organisations, if incentivised properly, can quickly scale and rapidly build capacity. The usual ghouls will whine and moan about “privatisation”, but a patient could not care less where they have a scan or receive treatment. Care should be put above politics, every single time.
Let’s overhaul the systems and drag them into the 21st century. Use smartphones, not snail mail to deliver results. Build and develop apps, whatever it takes to unclog the process. The NHS has proven it can do it.
I look back at the urgency and drive that was delivered for mass vaccination – why can’t that same effort be delivered to clear the cancer backlog? It would inevitably save more life-years than the vaccine drive, with far younger people currently afflicted by such severe delays.
Hospital and diagnostic centre car parks should be packed, all day and night – even at weekends. Yes, it will cost but that’s an investment well worth making. It’s no exaggeration to say it would save thousands and thousands of lives.
Government, whoever is in power, needs to urgently show some vision and show some ambition, which can only be fulfilled with thinking outside the box – more of the same is not an option.
Professor Karol Sikora is a leading cancer specialist
