Letter: Shropshire Star

No money for NHS as it is being diverted

A woman has lost her legal battle to be awarded the potentially life-saving drug Herceptin.

She now faces the very real prospect of an untimely death through the return of her breast cancer.

A group of Shropshire women are awaiting their day in court to try and secure the right to a life-saving course of Herceptin where they will, no doubt, receive exactly the same answer.

Today I read Herceptin is being routinely prescribed to women with breast cancer in the UK - but only if they live in Scotland.

The Barnett Formula diverts enough tax away from England to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland for them to be able to offer expensive drugs such as Herceptin ana leave the English NHS on the verge of bankruptcy.

A Scottish woman is allowed Herceptin, regardless of the cost, because the English taxpayer is paying for it.

An English woman is denied the drug because there isn't enough money left in England to pay for it after the rest of the UK have taken what they want.

The true cost to England of Gordon Brown's vision of Britain can be measured not only in billions of pounds but in the needless loss of English lives just to keep the fifth of the population who don't live in England healthy and happy.

Shropshire's contribution to the annual subsidy paid to Scotland alone would pay Shropshire NHS's £30m debt twice over in one year.

Stuart Parr
Telford