'A tour de force.' Professor Clare Gerada,
The Lancet
'In a post-truth world in which politicians spin and lie and lazy journalists fail to challenge them, to read The State of Medicine is a joy notwithstanding its serious, indeed deeply worrying, messages. An expert case for an evidence- and value-based NHS is made with clarity and passion by someone who is herself delivering medicine in the real world. It should be read by anyone who has an interest in healthcare which is all of us. Please let this book be influential because it could save lives.' Professor Ray Tallis
'[McCartney] writes with passion and barely disguised anger about the way our NHS, forged in 1948 and based on the highest principles of human rights, has been subverted for short term economies and populist decrees by all shades of the political spectrum.' Professor Mike Baum
'Superb.' Professor Allyson Pollock, Newcastle University
'A remarkable book.' Muir Gray
'Stop the NHS decaying info the U$A system! Read this great book! Take action!' Samuel Shem, author of The House of God
The NHS is the closest thing the UK has to a national religion. No wonder: it unites people across social and class divides. But it is also under pressure, underfunded, and unravelling at the seams. When the NHS was founded, children died of whooping cough and tuberculosis, and the average person lived less than 50 years. Now childhood deaths are rare and we expect to live almost twice as long. Many of us swallow dozens of daily medications, and the NHS promises to keep treating us, rich or poor, according to need. But as social care budgets are slashed, the pressure on the NHS has reached a critical level - along with accusations of high death rates, lazy, uncaring staff morale, and unnecessary deaths at the weekend.
Margaret McCartney, author of The Patient Paradox and Living with Dying, argues that the last few decades of short-term political policies have caused lasting damage to the NHS, wasting money, time, harming patients, and damaging staff morale. Instead, we need a new realisation of the founding principles of the NHS, one where patients and professionals work together to create an evidence-based - not a party political - NHS. It is the only future it can survive in.
Margaret McCartney is a GP in Glasgow, and has three children. She started writing for the press after being infuriated by an article in a newspaper which claimed that CT body screening was the way to stay well. Since then she has written for most UK newspapers, as well as the British Medical Journal (BMJ), other magazines such as Vogue and Prospect, has had columns in the Guardian and the FT Weekend, and is a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4's Inside Health. She has won prizes from the Medical Journalists' Association and the European School of Oncology, as well as the Healthwatch award. She has a strong interest in evidence, professionalism, screening and risk. She blogs and tweets. Margaret is the author of The Patient Paradox and Living with Dying. www.margaretmccartney.com/blog Twitter: @mgtmccartney
