The NHS 75 years on

The National Health Service marked it 75th anniversary this week. But while the tributes pour in striking nurses, doctors and ancillary workers, overcrowded surgeries and long hospital waiting lists tell another story.
The NHS embodied the hopes and dreams of the labour movement whose campaign for free medical treatment for the masses cumulated in the opening of the health service on 5th July 1948.
A National Health Service, delivered free to all at the time of need, is an essential requirement if people are to play an active part in society.
The expectation of the working class in the post‑war period for some dramatic changes to their lives resulted in the birth of the NHS, under the post‑war Labour Government. The NHS was revered throughout the capitalist world.
It came with a price. The consultants demanded the continuation of privately paid healthcare, alongside their services to the NHS. Their demands were met.
The wealthy continued to receive their personalised healthcare; the consultants were able to continue to receive lucrative payment for this private business.
The idea of making profit from the sick continued and the NHS would be viewed by capitalists as a valuable asset later as the conditions changed.
Though the NHS was built with public taxation it was later opened up for capitalist exploitation.
The introduction of private healthcare insurance enabled the private sector to grow. Companies could use it as part of a salary package to some top employees. Others paid privately for health insurance, and later some would pay out of savings to get an earlier consultation and then have quicker access to the NHS, as waiting lists grew.
All public bodies were encouraged to obtain private finance to pay for major projects like hospitals with no exception. New hospitals were built and leased back. The conditions were set by the financiers. Rates were set for an agreed period, and then the financiers could increase their charges. This led to hospitals becoming more indebted and vulnerable to private take over.
Nevertheless the NHS has continued to serve the people through preventative medicine and medical research. Large-scale vaccination programmes protected children from whooping cough, measles and tuberculosis and more recently helped quell the Covid pandemic that threatened to bring the country to its knees in 2020. The NHS has also pioneered new treatments like Britain’s first kidney transplant in 1960 and Europe’s first liver transplant in 1968 and advanced medical research such as bionic eyes and the world’s first rapid whole genome sequencing service for seriously ill babies and children.
This week we’ve had the usual tributes from bourgeois politicians of all hues whose platitudes mask the fact that Starmer’s Labour Party looks on the Sunak government’s butchery of the NHS with the tacit approval  that allows the Tories to continue to privatise the already seriously under-funded health service.
Capitalists view health as a commodity. We, however. regard a National Health Service as a cornerstone to our society, to treat all, when needed, paid through a fair taxation system, to give good after‑care, to prevent the spread of disease and encourage and promote a healthy lifestyle. A good NHS is essential for a healthy population and essential to a socialist society and socialist economy.