Around 10,000 people in the UK, mainly of black, Asian and Mediterranean origin, have sickle cell anaemia. Another 800 have the most dangerous form of thalassaemia, a similar disease. Sufferers of the two conditions must undergo regular blood transfusions.
Part of the treatment can either be 2 pills a day that cleanses their blood of life-threatening excess iron - a side effect of the frequent blood transfusions needed to treat the disease -- or alternatively , insert a needle into their stomach for eight to 12 hours a night at least five nights a week .
While the drug is available in Scotland, most patients in England are not able to get it because local NHS organisations are refusing to pay for a drug that costs £10,000-£15,000 for a year's supply for a young person. So now it's back to these injections which many families find highly stressful and do only infrequently, thus endangering the child's life.
Dr Farrukh Shah, a consultant haematologist at the Whittington Hospital in London, said: 'All patients who would benefit from Exjade should get it without arguments about who's going to fund it. They are being made victims of NHS internal politics. It's all down to people passing the buck financially between hospitals and Primary Care Trusts.... It's distressing for patients and their parents. Patients are struggling to maintain the needle treatment and desperately want to get Exjade, but many can't. When I tell them that their PCT has refused to pay for something that would make their life a whole lot easier in many ways, many end up crying.'
Vanessa Bourne of the Patients' Association said :"..you can't expect a parent to put a needle in their child's stomach every night because that treatment is so horrible to administer. Would PCT bosses, as parents, wish to do this to their child every night?..."
And while we are constantly admonished to care for our young , Capitalism simply counts up the pounds and the pence .
The Glasgow & Edinburgh Branches Blog. Towards a better understanding of the world, in order to change it.
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Paternalism is a common attitude among well-meaning social reformers. Stemming from the root pater, or father, paternalism implies a patria...
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This is an example of what the Socialist Standard was referring to in The Voice From the Back column.(See below)
SO WHATS NEW?
"British doctors will take the historic step of admitting for the first time that many health treatments will be rationed in the future because the NHS cannot cope with spiralling demand from patients." (Observer, 5 May) What is historic about that? Everything that is produced inside capitalism whether it be food, clothing, shelter, education or health care is always available to the rich, and they make sure they get the absolute best. How often at your local doctor's surgery or emergency ward in a hospital have you found yourself rubbing shoulders with millionaires?
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