Why our Hospitals are in a mess

Post by Rich80105
https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/checkpoint/audio/2018638252/dhbs-under-relentless-pressure-to-make-surplus
First National kept reducing budgets - managers were required to
pretend that services were not being reduced as they found "efficiency
savings".
Then Managers were not allowed to make any comments that would
embarrass the Minister.
If they offended they lost their job
Not surprisingly, some DHBs dod not tell the minister anything he did
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/353602/sewage-leaking-into-middlemore-building-s-walls
Remedial work on the hospital system alone is worth more than "the
"budget hole" Steven Joyce left for the next government

Our hospitals have been in a mess going back before 1995 to my knowledge Rich. Don't show just how one eyed and stupid you are by forgetting Labour has had plenty of time to do something about this. It's like the so called housing crisis and poverty. Things Labour have failed at as well as National.

Now be a good fellow and stop trolling and come up with some facts that haven't been massaged massively by Twyford, Ardern or any of the useless buggers you think are pushing new ideas rather than the same tired bullshit they were pushing back in the early 1900's.

Oh by the way has Robbie found the $11 billion hole yet that was reported by thestranded? :)

Oh and to bring you up to date Labour's now a dirty word in Greymouth because the failed to do what was promised to get their hospital fixed!

george152

2018-03-29 19:38:46 UTC

Post by b***@gmail.com
Our hospitals have been in a mess going back before 1995 to my knowledge Rich. Don't show just how one eyed and stupid you are by forgetting Labour has had plenty of time to do something about this. It's like the so called housing crisis and poverty. Things Labour have failed at as well as National.
Now be a good fellow and stop trolling and come up with some facts that haven't been massaged massively by Twyford, Ardern or any of the useless buggers you think are pushing new ideas rather than the same tired bullshit they were pushing back in the early 1900's.
Oh by the way has Robbie found the $11 billion hole yet that was reported by thestranded? :)
Oh and to bring you up to date Labour's now a dirty word in Greymouth because the failed to do what was promised to get their hospital fixed!

I have had occasion a couple of years ago to enjoy a hospital stay.
BOTH IN THE OLD AND NEW SECTIONS
Of course buildings deteriorate but to claim that the deterioration
happened under one particular government at one particular time is
ridiculous..
And how is it that great amounts of money are poured into Health without
any visible signs?

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b***@gmail.com

2018-03-29 22:31:50 UTC

Post by george152

I have had occasion a couple of years ago to enjoy a hospital stay.
BOTH IN THE OLD AND NEW SECTIONS
Of course buildings deteriorate but to claim that the deterioration
happened under one particular government at one particular time is
ridiculous..
And how is it that great amounts of money are poured into Health without
any visible signs?
---
This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
https://www.avast.com/antivirus

Don't get upset at Rich mate. The trolling marxist muppets just having another orgasm in his own inimitable style :)

Crash

2018-03-29 22:32:06 UTC

Rich you have conveniently omitted the fact that whenever the
government lead party changes (both to Labour and to National), they
always inherit an underfunded and miss-managed health system. If you
have any information that the current situation is worse than in 2008,
1999, 1990 etc feel free to cite your sources. If you cannot do this
then you are simply following a boring trend of National-bashing with
(in this thread) a blunt health-funding instrument.

--
Crash McBash

Gordon

2018-03-30 03:22:50 UTC

The health system in any developed world can swallow the whole countries GDP
in one swoop. It is impossible to fund the health system to a level which
gives top notch health care to all. So in effect it always underfunded and
this brings us to the question of *value*, as in what things can we do
without which will have little affect.

In this ng there are poltical party bashers, so that what we get. Bash any
of the other party bashers.

j***@gmail.com

2018-03-30 20:38:16 UTC

With health care costs the sky's the limit. Increasing populations drive increasing demand, and with such rapid advances in medicine such demand can and does only increase further. Together, these two factors alone result in an ever-increasing disparity between level of need and degree of provision.

In essence, the best most governments can do when budgeting for health care is to tread water. In New Zealand it can never be better than this for as long as national productivity and average incomes continue to be so pitiful, with tax-funded budget shortfalls having to be made up by borrowing.

All of it made infinitely worse by a population that goes out of its way to make itself sick through habits of diet and slothfulness brought on by ignorance and downright stupidity, and with a goodly portion of self-righteous entitlement thrown in.

At the primary local GP level, I think New Zealand does pretty well, although this is partly due to our ostensibly 'free' health service being 'subsidised' by the patient paying a portion of the cost.

Those past retirement age and already in persistently poor health, self-inflicted or otherwise, and who don't have pretty comprehensive private health cover are, essentially, doomed.

Post by Gordon
In this ng there are poltical party bashers, so that what we get. Bash any
of the other party bashers.

Not really a problem since they're eminently ignorable. However, there are one or two infantile sans-vie attention-seekers with nothing to contribute to a topic other than their own yah-boo barracking, one in particular being so dismally untutored that he can't even write a plural noun correctly.

Crash

2018-03-30 21:41:56 UTC

Correct. Front-page news today in the DomPost is the waiting time for
the MRI scanner at Wellington Hospital. This was only installed in
recent years.

Post by j***@gmail.com
All of it made infinitely worse by a population that goes out of its way to make itself sick through habits of diet and slothfulness brought
on by ignorance and downright stupidity,

Remember when fats were bad? Cholesterol levels to be lowered at all
costs? Now largely debunked - so factor in dietary solutions
supported by the medical profession that were to lead to better health
but did not. Currently sugar is the evil.

Post by j***@gmail.com
and with a goodly portion of self-righteous entitlement thrown in.

Cultural or religious requirements?

Post by j***@gmail.com
At the primary local GP level, I think New Zealand does pretty well, although this is partly due to our ostensibly 'free' health service
being 'subsidised' by the patient paying a portion of the cost.
Those past retirement age and already in persistently poor health, self-inflicted or otherwise, and who don't have pretty
comprehensive private health cover are, essentially, doomed.

In my 50s I started to see spiraling premiums for health insurance. My
wife and I opted out, instead putting the equivalent to those premium
payments into a special-purpose high-interest savings account. We now
have enough in that account to cover private treatment of major
illness or surgery - effectively we are self-insured.

Post by Gordon
In this ng there are poltical party bashers, so that what we get. Bash any
of the other party bashers.

Not really a problem since they're eminently ignorable. However, there are one or two infantile sans-vie attention-seekers with nothing to
contribute to a topic other than their own yah-boo barracking, one in particular being so dismally untutored that he can't even
write a plural noun correctly.

--
Crash McBash

j***@gmail.com

2018-03-31 00:03:25 UTC

Correct. Front-page news today in the DomPost is the waiting time for
the MRI scanner at Wellington Hospital. This was only installed in
recent years.

But still New Zealand grows ever more obese.

Health is Fashion; Health is Style: Health is Gym. Billions are made out of these every single day; just check out the loony-priced junk jamming your local Countdown shelves: no more than sugar, fat and salt, emulsified crud-plus-additives dressed up in eye-catching six-colour cartons and megaphoned as healthy low-fat good-for-you nutrition. But it's actually no longer food at all, being nothing but slick consumable branding for the terminally gullible.

This, and over-eating on poor diet, are the nub of it. In-plain-sight gluttony is scarcely even noticed let alone remarked on since the disorder is now so common the slugs don't even know they're doing it. Then, in all their grunting stupor, the same gut-stuffers burn off one percent of it as dead-eyed TV sofa-jockeys.

(En passant, in the past I always actively avoided flying cattle class long-haul on Air New Zealand, this for the sole reason that there would be a more than 50/50 risk of finding myself wedged up for endless hours against some obese leviathan in a hairy-armpit singlet and snoring like a chainsaw.)

Post by j***@gmail.com
and with a goodly portion of self-righteous entitlement thrown in.

Cultural or religious requirements?

I'm not quite sure of the meaning of your query in the context of what is, essentially, an escalating scenario of wanton self-harm.

If it's about stupidity-as-culture, then, allowing for the percentage of those of a low-mentality who will always be with us, certainly this would include the pitfalls of the consulting room. Here, a GP friend has told me, he must always be on his guard against telling a patient he/she (quote) "needs to lose weight," because, even though the patient bloody well knows it's the simple honest truth, it's classified as judgemental and discriminatory and therefore culturally unacceptable, even implying - again in his words - "the risk of disciplinary action being brought against me."

Slack-jaw cretinous, of course, when politically-driven personal sensitivities rank higher than the individual's own physical wellbeing, but this kind of thing only goes to show just how far New Zealand has gone down its dead-end path of institutionalised denialism which has now both perverted and subverted its entire cultural ethos.

And, if by religion you mean the inhibitions and repressions of intractable religious beliefs outranking the provision of curative health to the believer, then simply let Darwinism do its work and give the patient a sick note inscribed, "The patient is advised to take as much time as needed, while earning or otherwise, to die of his/her own self-instigated condition."

Then your percipience has paid off, and good for you, I say. Provision for later life can never be a bad idea to which I can certainly attest - but even then, the proviso remains that it be affordable from the outset together with some promise of what was then automatically presumed a given: a stable future income with the consistent prospect of its increasing over the forthcoming in-work decades. This is no longer so, and the ramifications are already with us.

But times have changed and with them the economic circumstances driven by the financial mores and priorities of nations. So the question now is whether, for the majority, and in a scenario of ever-rising costs - significantly in 21st century this being housing of whatever kind - too many of the current and future rising generation will, in fact, be able to afford the costs of the latter-day percipience that was not only affordable in your day but has also benefited you (and me) so well.

Already, the signs are that they won't, zero-productivity sky-high asset values in a perniciously low-productivity economy being mutually incompatible when it comes to the affordability of housing, or anything else for that matter.

Our perniciously low savings rate combined with the inexorably mounting level of New Zealand's household debt is the unwelcome barometer of this country's current condition.

New Zealand cannot afford itself, and this debt-funded poverty trap of its own making cannot and will not end until one it gets down to doing an honest **productive** day's work, thus earning this country enough to be able to do so.

All else is gaslight.

Rich80105

2018-03-31 04:25:37 UTC

Correct. Front-page news today in the DomPost is the waiting time for
the MRI scanner at Wellington Hospital. This was only installed in
recent years.

But still New Zealand grows ever more obese.
Health is Fashion; Health is Style: Health is Gym. Billions are made out of these every single day; just check out the loony-priced junk jamming your local Countdown shelves: no more than sugar, fat and salt, emulsified crud-plus-additives dressed up in eye-catching six-colour cartons and megaphoned as healthy low-fat good-for-you nutrition. But it's actually no longer food at all, being nothing but slick consumable branding for the terminally gullible.
This, and over-eating on poor diet, are the nub of it. In-plain-sight gluttony is scarcely even noticed let alone remarked on since the disorder is now so common the slugs don't even know they're doing it. Then, in all their grunting stupor, the same gut-stuffers burn off one percent of it as dead-eyed TV sofa-jockeys.
(En passant, in the past I always actively avoided flying cattle class long-haul on Air New Zealand, this for the sole reason that there would be a more than 50/50 risk of finding myself wedged up for endless hours against some obese leviathan in a hairy-armpit singlet and snoring like a chainsaw.)

Post by j***@gmail.com
and with a goodly portion of self-righteous entitlement thrown in.

Cultural or religious requirements?

I'm not quite sure of the meaning of your query in the context of what is, essentially, an escalating scenario of wanton self-harm.
If it's about stupidity-as-culture, then, allowing for the percentage of those of a low-mentality who will always be with us, certainly this would include the pitfalls of the consulting room. Here, a GP friend has told me, he must always be on his guard against telling a patient he/she (quote) "needs to lose weight," because, even though the patient bloody well knows it's the simple honest truth, it's classified as judgemental and discriminatory and therefore culturally unacceptable, even implying - again in his words - "the risk of disciplinary action being brought against me."
Slack-jaw cretinous, of course, when politically-driven personal sensitivities rank higher than the individual's own physical wellbeing, but this kind of thing only goes to show just how far New Zealand has gone down its dead-end path of institutionalised denialism which has now both perverted and subverted its entire cultural ethos.
And, if by religion you mean the inhibitions and repressions of intractable religious beliefs outranking the provision of curative health to the believer, then simply let Darwinism do its work and give the patient a sick note inscribed, "The patient is advised to take as much time as needed, while earning or otherwise, to die of his/her own self-instigated condition."

You are lucky to have been in a financial position to do this. My
family did have health insurance for many years - rates are cheaper
when arranged on a group basis through an employer, and we wanted
cover for our children. I too in my 50s re-assessed and at that time
looked into the relative merits of paying for insurance. At that time
the industry average of expenses of collection and administration (and
not allowing for any dividend payments to shareholders) amounted to
over 20% of premiums - self insurance is not as secure or complete,
but it does save those expenses! (Southern Cross as the largest
insurer had a lower expense ratio, but even it was over 10%).
Unfortunately I think that for my family it has been around
break-even, but I have not tracked it allowing for the increases in
premiums allowing for inflation and older ages . . .

Post by j***@gmail.com
Then your percipience has paid off, and good for you, I say. Provision for later life can never be a bad idea to which I can certainly attest - but even then, the proviso remains that it be affordable from the outset together with some promise of what was then automatically presumed a given: a stable future income with the consistent prospect of its increasing over the forthcoming in-work decades. This is no longer so, and the ramifications are already with us.

Affordability is of course something that prevents many from being
able to afford health insurance - or indeed to develop any savings to
create a fund for the future. Inequality has been shown to have
increased over the last 9 years - and if health insurance is seen as
necessary for maintenance of a reasonable standard of living, then
there has definately been a failure over the period of the
National-led government from 2008.

Post by j***@gmail.com
But times have changed and with them the economic circumstances driven by the financial mores and priorities of nations. So the question now is whether, for the majority, and in a scenario of ever-rising costs - significantly in 21st century this being housing of whatever kind - too many of the current and future rising generation will, in fact, be able to afford the costs of the latter-day percipience that was not only affordable in your day but has also benefited you (and me) so well.
Already, the signs are that they won't, zero-productivity sky-high asset values in a perniciously low-productivity economy being mutually incompatible when it comes to the affordability of housing, or anything else for that matter.
Our perniciously low savings rate combined with the inexorably mounting level of New Zealand's household debt is the unwelcome barometer of this country's current condition.
New Zealand cannot afford itself, and this debt-funded poverty trap of its own making cannot and will not end until one it gets down to doing an honest **productive** day's work, thus earning this country enough to be able to do so.
All else is gaslight.

Some of what you see as low productivity is undoubtedly true - there
is not much lower productivity for the country than the unemployed
(for whom stress, poor diet etc there is also a higher demand for
health and other services). But a recent list of companies that paid a
zero or very low effective tax rate was notable for including many
overseas owned companies that are noted for being profitable - in
effect an increasing amount of our hard work now goes overseas and is
not available to boost our total New Zealand based productivity. Poor
decisions come back through poor statistics in a lot of areas where
the link may not always be obvious.

Rich80105

2018-03-31 03:57:53 UTC

Sorry I'm not going to do your research for you. With an aging
population and increasing population National consistently reduced
funding per head of population in post-inflation terms. If you cannot
prove otherwise then you cannot justify that the National-led
government inherited a worse underfunded and mis-managed system in
2008 than the Labour-led government did in 2017.

Your statement is effectively that National favourite - but all
government do it!

Post by Gordon
The health system in any developed world can swallow the whole countries GDP
in one swoop. It is impossible to fund the health system to a level which
gives top notch health care to all. So in effect it always underfunded and
this brings us to the question of *value*, as in what things can we do
without which will have little affect.

That is a peculiar definition of underfunding - try applying it to say
transportation - every government has failed that has not provided all
New AZealanders with public transport that at any time will deiver
them to their place of work in less than 30 minutes - all at
affordable cost.

Post by j***@gmail.com
With health care costs the sky's the limit. Increasing populations
drive increasing demand, and with such rapid advances in medicine such
demand can and does only increase further. Together, these two
factors alone result in an ever-increasing disparity between level of
need and degree of provision.

Not so - expectatons do need to be managed; most New Zealanders do
realise that we do not have infinite resources, that there have always
been limits on availbility of the latest treatments - again that is an
argument that if perfection cannot be afforded any degree of failure
is not of any significance. Tell that to the increasing number of
families that cannot even get themselves on a doctors list of patients
- or that cannot afford the 'part charges' that many GPs now require.
Tell that also to those on waiting lists that are longer than they
were 9 years ago - for "standard" surgical needs - or the pregnant
women that cannot find a midwife as too many have rejected the low pay
and over-work, and new mifives are not coming forward to be trained .
. .

Post by j***@gmail.com
In essence, the best most governments can do when budgeting for health care is to tread water. In New Zealand it can never be better than this for as long as national productivity and average incomes continue to be so pitiful, with tax-funded budget shortfalls having to be made up by borrowing.
All of it made infinitely worse by a population that goes out of its way to make itself sick through habits of diet and slothfulness brought on by ignorance and downright stupidity, and with a goodly portion of self-righteous entitlement thrown in.

Indeed health services have been stretched by the return of diseases
of poverty, while at the other end we have an increasing number of
people able to afford to "go private" - but that only gives priority
within the overall health system that relies on many of hte same total
staff to serve both provate and public hopsitals; it does not increase
the number of doctors and specialists (we are also getting more people
travelling overseas for particular services not available, or no
longer available in New Zealand . . .

Agreed - my doctor however now charges from $40 to $60 for a
consultation . . . and is not accepting more patients from the local
area . . .

Post by j***@gmail.com
Those past retirement age and already in persistently poor health, self-inflicted or otherwise, and who don't have pretty comprehensive private health cover are, essentially, doomed.

Sadly that perception is by design, but in the last year or so there
have been indications that the private health insurance industry is in
trouble. Healthy yourng people are finding they cannot afford health
insurance, and with an aging population they are finding it harder to
get a balanced pool - so premiums at older age are increasing at well
over inflation (and certainly faster than most retirement incomes),
and some companies are starting to limit claims in any one year, or
decline to cover some procedures.