BEVAN'S NHS

Nye Bevan the founder of the National Health Service

The establishment of the NHS was the result of the expectations of both the country and the Labour government. It owed a great deal to the skill and energy of Nye Bevan, the Minister for Health.The Emergency Medical Service and the Beveridge Report formed the basis of the NHS. In effect the war had stimulated the changes that were so necessary in the British health care system. People had become used to the care that kept the working population fighting fit. The new antibiotics also created a feeling that for the first time there were real cures for the whole range of infectious diseases.

At the end of the war it was clear that the old hospital system could not be revived. The voluntary hospitals in Kent continued to raise money but it was only a tiny proportion of that which was needed. When Bevan nationalised the hospitals and he faced very little opposition. The hospital consultants were happy with the new arrangements and many Kent hospitals had highly qualified staff for the first time.

The General Practitioners, the local doctors, were opposed to the new service at the beginning of 1948. They dislike the idea of not having paying patients and did not want to lose the right to buy and sell their practices. Many considered they would simply become civil servants. By July 5th 1948, the first day of the new service, nearly all the doctors had changed their minds. They knew that if NHS doctors were free then they would not be able to attract any patients and charge them.

The costs of the NHS doubled and then trebled in the first few years. Where Beveridge and Bevan had expected costs to fall they rose rapidly. They thought that people would become more healthy and not need so much treatment. They were wrong. What they had failed to recognise was the hidden suffering that had been in existence amongst a large proportion of the population.

In Kent as in other parts of the country, women came forward with illnesses that they had been suffering from for years. Whilst there had been charges for medical attention they had sacrificed their health for that of their family. With a free system these concerns no longer applied. In Gravesend there were queues outside the hospital and dentists throughout the county were fully booked for months.

Despite its unexpected cost in the early years the NHS is a fair and efficient system, far better than anything known in the 1930’s and more economical than any other service in the world.