The NHS risks going “the Woolworths way” if it fails to adopt new technology that will make it more efficient, Wes Streeting has warned.
Labour’s shadow health secretary said the service must modernize because there is “no possibility” of spending increasing much and “no future” if it continues to rely on ” obsolete” and “expensive”.
He compared the NHS to Woolies, which he described as a “much-loved national institution” but which “failed to move with the times and was left behind”.
The High Street retailer closed its doors in 2009, leading to the loss of more than 800 stores, after struggling to recover from the 2008 financial crash.
Mr Streeting said the Government had been too “timid” when it came to implementing the changes needed to grow the NHS and insisted it would go further.
Speaking at the WIRED Health event in London this afternoon, Labor’s shadow health spokesman Wes Streeting said the Conservatives had been too timid and Labor would go further . He said this would include sharing all GP patient records across health services so people could benefit from better coordinated care.
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He vowed to confront the “vested interests” of those who promote the status quo and take on “alarmists” from the “tinfoil hat brigade” on social media, who he said , have undue influence over NHS policy.
The Ilford North MP said he would force GPs to share patients’ medical records within the health service so people can receive better integrated care.
It would also lead to the development of new treatments, better sharing of preventative health advice and the opportunity to participate in more clinical trials, he added.
Current plans for the NHS’s ‘federated data platform’ only include sharing hospital data – and even that has sparked outrage from privacy campaigners.
Speaking at the WIRED Health event in London this afternoon, Mr Streeting said: “Unlocking the power of technology is not abstract.
“It’s about how many patients the NHS can treat and how long they have to wait.”
“It’s also about our experience as patients. How we are kept informed and how our time is respected.
“An estimated 13.5 million hours of physician time are lost each year due to inefficient IT.
“Fixing this problem would be the equivalent of 8,000 new doctors joining the NHS.” It’s the difference between the huge staff shortage in the NHS and filling almost all doctor vacancies.
“With our country’s population aging, population health declining and chronic disease increasing, it is also about the sustainability of the NHS: its ability to survive over the coming decade.
Mr Streeting said: “There is no future for the NHS that involves continuing with an outdated, inefficient and costly way of working, while demands on the service increase and costs pile up. . “The NHS is at a crossroads. Another five years of Conservative government, and it could go the way of Woolworths: a much-loved national institution that has failed to move with the times and been left behind. Pictured is Woolworths in Ledbury, Herefordshire in 2000
“The health budget represented 42 percent of departmental expenditure this year. Because the Conservatives have brought the economy down, there is no possibility of going any further.
“So there is no future for the NHS that involves continuing with an outdated, inefficient and costly way of working, while demands on the service increase and costs pile up.”
He added: “The NHS is at a crossroads. Another five years of Conservative government, and it could go the way of Woolworths: a much-loved national institution that has failed to move with the times and been left behind.
“This is the path we are following today. But this is not inevitable. The NHS can change and the staff who work there are crying out for change.
His comments come a fortnight after Health Secretary Victoria Atkins said the NHS needed an “M&S moment”.
She revealed the Department of Health and Social Care hired former M&S chief executive Steve Rowe as NHS productivity tsar after crediting him with bringing the store “out of the doldrums”.
Ms Atkins said the “stalwart” turned around its fortunes by “embracing modernity” and demanded the health service do the same.
She added: “We are on the cusp of a medical revolution, where technology, personalized therapies and better data can transform outcomes for a generation more health-conscious than any that came before.
“The NHS must seize this opportunity and look to the future, not limited to what has always been done.” In fact, there must be – to borrow a phrase – an M&S moment.