Lest We Forget
Here's another devastating extract from Private Eye's analysis of the Francis Report into Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust.
Lest we forget
"If you only have time to read one Francis report, make it his first independent inquiry, published in February 2010. The stories behind the harm are staggering.
An old man forced to stay on a commode for 55 minutes wearing only a pyjama top; a woman whose legs were 'red raw' because of the effect of her uncleaned faeces; piles of soiled sheets and vomit bowls left at the end of beds, a woman arrived at 10am to find her 96-year old mother-in-law 'completely naked ... and covered with faeces ....It was in her hair, her nails, her hands and on all the cot sides.....it was literally everywhere and it was dried.'
Another woamn who found her mother with faces under her nails asked for them to be cut, but was told that it was 'not in the nurses' remit to cut patients' nails.
The care was so bad that as many as 1,200 people dued unnecessarily, often in applling conditions. The poor care was known about for years and flagged up by successive mortality data alerts. The problem was that no one acted on the datat or listened to the patients and their relatives. And whistleblowers were threatened with silence. Whoever oversaw such a climate of fear in the NHS has to go"
Now that's what I calling telling it straight and not pulling your punches - but where is the rest of the great British press and media - in calling senior NHS managers and their political masters to account?
