COLLABORATION WITH THE PRIVATE SECTOR: PROBLEMS FOR DISTRICT HEALTH AUTHORITIES
| Author | JOAN HIGGINS |
| Date | 01 June 1983 |
| Published date | 01 June 1983 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.1983.tb00515.x |
216
PUBLIC
ADMINISTRATION
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COLLABORATION
WITH
THE PRIVATE SECTOR: PROBLEMS
FOR
DISTRICT
HEALTH
AUTHORITIES
The recent
growth
of
private medicine
The debate about private medicine has never been far from the political agenda in
Britain and in the last two or three years it has once again appeared there as an item
for public concern.
A
number of developments since the mid-1970s have
underlined the problems of a predominantly public health care system which has
tried to accommodate a small, but growing, private sector.
First of all, there has been a rapid increase in the number of individuals and
groups taking out private health insurance.
A
16% increase in
UK
subscribers
in
1979 was followed by a 27% increase in 1980 and
a
13% increase in
1981.
By 1981
there were just under
two
million subscribers with insurance contracts providing
cover for more than
four
million people
(7%
of the population), in comparison with
only one and a half million insured persons in 1966
(Social
Trends1983,106). At the
same time, the decrease in the number of pay beds in
NHS
hospitals
-
from
4,200
in 1976 to 3,200 in 1980
-
has been accompanied by an increase in the number of
beds available in private nursing homes and private hospitals
-
from 30,600
in
1976 to 32,900
in
1980 (op. cit.,
105).
In the same period the number of private
hospitals, although still small, has increased to around
120
with another
20
or 30
now projected.
Second, the proposals of an unpublished Central Policy Review Staff
(CPRS)
report to cabinet in September 1982 led to speculation that the Conservative
Government intended to dismantle parts of the
NHS
and to encourage private
Public Administration
Vol.
61 Summer 1983 (216-220)
0
1983 Royal Institute of Public Administration
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