A system that is going to cost £6.2 billion plus “local costs” had better be good. That’s what the NHS compuerisation is supposed to cost. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/5118538.stm on 26 June 2006)
Assuming the UK population is 60,609,153 (July 2006 est.) on https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/print/uk.html and that the mentioned billion is the US billion (thousand million) that makes the cost £102.29 for every person in the UK or £153.22 for every person of working age (16 to 65, based on the same webpage)
I suspect that’s quite a bit more than GP gets for a year’s care. What are we getting for this? Was there seriously some problem with patients’ getting the wrong records? On a scale that would justify this expnditure? Seems more than unlikely to me.
There are plenty of news items about cutbacks in nursing and other staff, of NHS trust hospitals going bankrupt and so on. Could this £153 not be spent on doctors and nurses and paramedics and dentists and ambulance drivers and cleaners and radiographers?
In my GP’s surgery, the problem is getting an appointment – working your way round impenetrable arrangements that change every few weeks. Attempt to find an NHS dentist and even achieving the much-mocked British teeth become a distant dream. For all the complaints about the Health Service, I have yet to hear of anyone whose records have been lost. So what purpose will it serve?
I am probably a lot more computer-oriented as the next person and it’s always good to see jobs in IT. However, if I break my leg, I wont be yelling for a database technician.