In My View: Florence Eshalomi, MP for Vauxhall

The NHS is deeply personal for me.

My late mother suffered from sickle cell anaemia, a serious disease affecting red blood cells, and required regular blood transfusions.

Without these transfusions, and care during the searing pain of a sickle cell crises, her life would have ended a lot earlier.

It is thanks to the NHS that I got to spend this extra time with my mother, and it’s thanks to the NHS that I was able to bring a son and daughter of my own into the world at St Thomas’ Hospital.

I know that, in the 75-year history of the NHS, my story is far from alone.

St Thomas’ sits just over the river from Parliament, and whenever I see the hospital, I often think of the stories of life-changing treatment happening each and every day.

I also think of the difficulties faced by many during Covid, reminded of the lives lost by the Memorial Wall that seems like a sea of red from across the Thames.

And I think of the staff, who deliver the treatments that give people valuable years of life and worked heroically during the Covid-19 pandemic to save countless lives.

It is these staff who are the lifeblood of our NHS, and who keep it running despite the challenges it faces today.

And there can be no doubt that 13 years of Conservative mismanagement has put the NHS on its knees.

Seven million people are on waiting lists, with many off work waiting for treatment.

Stories of patients spending hours and hours in A&E going from the exception to the rule.

And mental health care still unavailable for many people who need it.

But rather than solve the acute NHS crisis, Rishi Sunak has decided to put the architect of this broken Conservative healthcare system in charge of the economy.

Does this not show that the Conservatives simply don’t understand the problem they have created?

That’s why we need a Labour government, to fix the fundamentals in the NHS, Give staff the support they badly need and deserve, And deliver a higher standard of care for patients, free at the point of need.

And a Labour government will deliver a NHS fit for the 21st century.

At a tech roundtable last week, someone said to me that, while it is wonderful to celebrate the NHS’s 75th birthday, too often the NHS feels like a 75-year-old organisation.

And this can’t continue.

We know people are living longer, with caring for chronic, long-term conditions more and more important.

We know the efficiency of tech has evolved exponentially and will continue to do so, yet too little of this is utilised in our treatments.

We know that mental health is a critically important part of our overall health, yet it continues to go chronically under-treated with patients suffering as a result.

Only through Labour’s mission to fix our health service will we see a NHS grapple with these issues; rejuvenated for the 2020s and beyond.