An exhausted NHS limps towards its high noon
Two and half years ago, as an unknown virus swept the nation, I found hope in an unlikely place: the NHS. Hospital doctors and nurses were gripped by a spirit of camaraderie and can-do, in stark contrast to the weary burnout we see today. As the NHS approaches its high noon, with the cataclysmic combination of nurses on strike for the first time in a century and ambulance workers to walk out next week, I remember that glimpse of a way to do things better.
I had a strange and privileged experience in 2020, as a temporary adviser to the Department of Health. Sitting in the dysfunctional centre of government, which had a vacuum where a prime minister should have been, I briefly witnessed a fragmented system come together to do what frontline staff thought was right for patients, liberated from some of the usual protocols.
When Covid hit, dental hygienists, surgeons and physiotherapists retrained as ICU nurses. Care workers gave insulin injections and wrote death certificates. Even the BMA, that bastion of conservatism, had to drop its attempt to stop medical students looking after Covid patients. At one Zoom conference I attended, organised by a surgeon, hundreds of GPs and consultants said passionately that they no longer wanted to work in silos; that they were collaborating in new ways; that they had been liberated from HR jargon and form-filling.
This story originally appeared on: Financial Times - Author:Camilla Cavendish
