Excellent summary, health must be quite giddy with all this spin going on. Levy, Reti and Luxon are all happy to look you in the eye, and lie - perhaps add Margie Apa to that list…
I'm a huge believer in facts so welcomed that, but .... the unabashedness of those that lie is disappointing.
To me, Levy comes across as untrustworthy and evasive, but it's like Trump. I see an unreliable, self serving liar in him. Many others see a God in his prime.
I find myself uncomfortable with the use of 'productivity' in relation to health care. Efficiencies, yes, improved care, yes, but productivity? No. I know it's just a word, but it's been wielded as a weapon to justify perverse outcomes too often. We've been here so many times. The starting point of being the wrong budget to start with and then squeezing and shuffling and lying that it's possible. Just get a bigger friggin dress size and admit I'm no longer 20!!
In terms of productivity in health, why is it not measured by the health of your population, not the turnover through the system?
This guy just talks about Luxon's KPIs and how he is going to force more productivity out - but there is significantly MORE to health care. Wait times can be manipulated, so can his numbers, but they are all untrustworthy measures - especially when in the wrong hands.
We need extensive KPIs - most importantly health and well-being, access to healthcare, preventative medicine, health and well being of medical practitioners etc!
The private system is more 'productive', ie profitable, because they cherry pick the easy cases, and leave those messy unprofitable chronic conditions for the public system.
👍🏾💯Same! What is "productivity"? Number of patients seen? (regardless of whether some were quick checkin/followups after surgery etc. OR major & complex emergencies or complex diagnostic consultations) Number of patients who LIVED? (compared to ...?)
thanks for keeping up with these machinations Tui. The NDAs are instructive of some major flaws they are hiding. Vote Health documents released last week have budget requested numbers redacted as well so they are covering up. I hope that Verral users her parliamentary privilege to expose some of this BS. I hope that the ex-CFO comes out swinging at some stage as well. I do love the talk about increased FTE, but what is missing is the denominator of what the system actually needs. example with the current collective agreement for "junior" doctors, their positions have been resized, i.e. they have better working conditions, less long hours etc but that means you need MORE FTE to deliver the same level of service as previously. i.e. you need more people to make up the roster, what you used to cover with 8 people, you now need 10. what is missing in the conversation is the 2nd number. Lester might be working to change this and also the scope of practice to force health workers to work across different areas but this is not going to go well, busting collective agreements is ERA territory and scope of practice is medical council, and massive issues with medicolegal implications.
Also we need specific examples of hiring being held off i.e. a hiring freeze. if people have actual examples this would be harder for them to refute.
I think there are doctors and nurses who have specifically come out to talk about the hiring freezes. I've been following this since December and they are definitely there.
That's why there is a huge disconnect because Kiwis hear that - but then balance that with the Luxon rhetoric i.e Labour left a huge mess so our hands are tied and we are just trying to fix this mess up.
It seems most of the public cannot tie 2 and 2 together. They do not understand the relationships or see the hypocrisy when Luxon says money is no effective object if he needs to imprison more Kiwis.
To what you say 100%
The absolute increases are thoroughly un-useful. Same as when they say "record investment in Health."
Well the per capita is what you need. Unfortunately our media is just.... shallow at this point. That said, at least RNZ and Newsroom are covering it as each practitioner comes forth.
[Not Bremner who painted the doctors she spoke to as "resistance"]
With the public, what wins is simple messages - I'm not that person either but there is something whereby people get loset in detail. So it has to be headlines.
Anyway grr.. I just saw a headline saying Simeon Brown is now funding 24 hour vans searching for potholes and my blood pressure went up a bit!
Thank you for your excellent, salient, and too accurate points Dave.
We need some type of union... across all the industries to speak up and shout out I think. I need the doctors and nurses to come out in unison - one voice ie. spokesperson clearly isn't loud enough against the lying pulpit of this government.
Jaysus wept. Uber for potholes? Pothole hotline? Pothole busters? Maybe a good use for all those ambulances we 'can't' afford to keep on the road? Or maybe police could have a pothole paddy wagon they could cruise around in during house inspections for gang insignia? Simple Simeon needs to stop watching Bob the Builder as his ministerial responsibilities reference material.
👍🏾👏🏾Very good points - particularly relevant is the improvement in working conditions for junior Drs meaning MORE needed to do the same hours with patients.
GRRR.... 🤬Not sure I needed another punchable face on my screen 🫢
What a load of gobbledygook corporate speak obfuscation & misdirections... He acts (with help from his enabling off-sider) as if it's his own little private fiefdom & not OUR public health sector, developed with OUR taxpayer $$$ over decades, built by OUR citizen Drs & Nurses & (yes) OUR citizen non-frontline staff doing the other essential work that makes the medical side actually function.
NDA's are an abomination in a public sector system, and glad Ayesha Verrall likened it to North Korea - we need some straight talk to this smug little dictator. 🤬
My memories of his time "fixing" the Canterbury Health system were that he was disruptive & not very successful & a lot of good people were lost/resigned. Would be interesting to know if the "success" he spouted at the other one was a) true and/or b) the ONLY time he's done anything that worked?🤔
Newsroom has multiple articles on him, they call him "destructive", they say he left things in worse shape and seemed to squeeze the organisation when he was there to make himself look good but after that, things went from bad to worse. Also he apparently yes busts up with most and is apparently top down and authoritative.
I mean when I listen to him talk, quite frankly, he sounds like a useless manager who says all the right words and is keen on personal enrichment, but cares nothing for the people, goals and authenticity of the organisation.
Listening to him say that he's not getting enough out of the "resources" and boasting about his own record was a little nauseating.
And Apa - I had been wondering why she was still there - but it was clear to me as soon as I saw them in action yesterday.
All Luxon and Levy need to do is hang in and package public Hospitals and their car parks for sale to a USA conglomerate health insurance company like AIG. Something easy like that could indeed be done in an 8 hour week. Dr Levy excellent remuneration is compensation for the public odium attached to eating rats. ACC could be thrown into the mix as a cash inducement for the ultimate buyer
I have read that a number of officials own shares in private hospitals too. I think that we have a real problem because none of our systems are designed for abuses and as you mention, paving roads ahead.
For example, Alan Gibbs, Atlas dude and ACT mega-donor wants everything privatised - hospitals, schools roads.
What I've learned is all their donor networks on the right are tight.
Excellent summary, health must be quite giddy with all this spin going on. Levy, Reti and Luxon are all happy to look you in the eye, and lie - perhaps add Margie Apa to that list…
The shamelessness is interesting, Keith!
This morning The Post's Thomas Manch calls out Reti for his lies - https://www.thepost.co.nz/politics/350419496/reti-derides-health-nz-pathfinders-and-boundary-spanners-dont-exist - which is quite refreshing to read in NZ Media.
I'm a huge believer in facts so welcomed that, but .... the unabashedness of those that lie is disappointing.
To me, Levy comes across as untrustworthy and evasive, but it's like Trump. I see an unreliable, self serving liar in him. Many others see a God in his prime.
One Earth. Two worlds.
<shrugs>
I agree! What a scandal!
I find myself uncomfortable with the use of 'productivity' in relation to health care. Efficiencies, yes, improved care, yes, but productivity? No. I know it's just a word, but it's been wielded as a weapon to justify perverse outcomes too often. We've been here so many times. The starting point of being the wrong budget to start with and then squeezing and shuffling and lying that it's possible. Just get a bigger friggin dress size and admit I'm no longer 20!!
In terms of productivity in health, why is it not measured by the health of your population, not the turnover through the system?
Yes exactly!
This guy just talks about Luxon's KPIs and how he is going to force more productivity out - but there is significantly MORE to health care. Wait times can be manipulated, so can his numbers, but they are all untrustworthy measures - especially when in the wrong hands.
We need extensive KPIs - most importantly health and well-being, access to healthcare, preventative medicine, health and well being of medical practitioners etc!
The private system is more 'productive', ie profitable, because they cherry pick the easy cases, and leave those messy unprofitable chronic conditions for the public system.
👍🏾💯Same! What is "productivity"? Number of patients seen? (regardless of whether some were quick checkin/followups after surgery etc. OR major & complex emergencies or complex diagnostic consultations) Number of patients who LIVED? (compared to ...?)
Can we start a union already? :-)
thanks for keeping up with these machinations Tui. The NDAs are instructive of some major flaws they are hiding. Vote Health documents released last week have budget requested numbers redacted as well so they are covering up. I hope that Verral users her parliamentary privilege to expose some of this BS. I hope that the ex-CFO comes out swinging at some stage as well. I do love the talk about increased FTE, but what is missing is the denominator of what the system actually needs. example with the current collective agreement for "junior" doctors, their positions have been resized, i.e. they have better working conditions, less long hours etc but that means you need MORE FTE to deliver the same level of service as previously. i.e. you need more people to make up the roster, what you used to cover with 8 people, you now need 10. what is missing in the conversation is the 2nd number. Lester might be working to change this and also the scope of practice to force health workers to work across different areas but this is not going to go well, busting collective agreements is ERA territory and scope of practice is medical council, and massive issues with medicolegal implications.
Also we need specific examples of hiring being held off i.e. a hiring freeze. if people have actual examples this would be harder for them to refute.
I think there are doctors and nurses who have specifically come out to talk about the hiring freezes. I've been following this since December and they are definitely there.
That's why there is a huge disconnect because Kiwis hear that - but then balance that with the Luxon rhetoric i.e Labour left a huge mess so our hands are tied and we are just trying to fix this mess up.
It seems most of the public cannot tie 2 and 2 together. They do not understand the relationships or see the hypocrisy when Luxon says money is no effective object if he needs to imprison more Kiwis.
To what you say 100%
The absolute increases are thoroughly un-useful. Same as when they say "record investment in Health."
Well the per capita is what you need. Unfortunately our media is just.... shallow at this point. That said, at least RNZ and Newsroom are covering it as each practitioner comes forth.
[Not Bremner who painted the doctors she spoke to as "resistance"]
With the public, what wins is simple messages - I'm not that person either but there is something whereby people get loset in detail. So it has to be headlines.
Anyway grr.. I just saw a headline saying Simeon Brown is now funding 24 hour vans searching for potholes and my blood pressure went up a bit!
Thank you for your excellent, salient, and too accurate points Dave.
We need some type of union... across all the industries to speak up and shout out I think. I need the doctors and nurses to come out in unison - one voice ie. spokesperson clearly isn't loud enough against the lying pulpit of this government.
Jaysus wept. Uber for potholes? Pothole hotline? Pothole busters? Maybe a good use for all those ambulances we 'can't' afford to keep on the road? Or maybe police could have a pothole paddy wagon they could cruise around in during house inspections for gang insignia? Simple Simeon needs to stop watching Bob the Builder as his ministerial responsibilities reference material.
Ha I like that last part Lynette. I have to admit the Brown guy gets my blood pressure up every time. Particularly juvenile.
👍🏾👏🏾Very good points - particularly relevant is the improvement in working conditions for junior Drs meaning MORE needed to do the same hours with patients.
GRRR.... 🤬Not sure I needed another punchable face on my screen 🫢
What a load of gobbledygook corporate speak obfuscation & misdirections... He acts (with help from his enabling off-sider) as if it's his own little private fiefdom & not OUR public health sector, developed with OUR taxpayer $$$ over decades, built by OUR citizen Drs & Nurses & (yes) OUR citizen non-frontline staff doing the other essential work that makes the medical side actually function.
NDA's are an abomination in a public sector system, and glad Ayesha Verrall likened it to North Korea - we need some straight talk to this smug little dictator. 🤬
My memories of his time "fixing" the Canterbury Health system were that he was disruptive & not very successful & a lot of good people were lost/resigned. Would be interesting to know if the "success" he spouted at the other one was a) true and/or b) the ONLY time he's done anything that worked?🤔
Newsroom has multiple articles on him, they call him "destructive", they say he left things in worse shape and seemed to squeeze the organisation when he was there to make himself look good but after that, things went from bad to worse. Also he apparently yes busts up with most and is apparently top down and authoritative.
I mean when I listen to him talk, quite frankly, he sounds like a useless manager who says all the right words and is keen on personal enrichment, but cares nothing for the people, goals and authenticity of the organisation.
Listening to him say that he's not getting enough out of the "resources" and boasting about his own record was a little nauseating.
And Apa - I had been wondering why she was still there - but it was clear to me as soon as I saw them in action yesterday.
Yep he's been a "spray and walk away" guy, in every job he's held.
Plenty of anecdotable evidence from former employees
Lester and Margie is north of a million in taxes/health funding
Easy cuts? We can do it for 10K Mr A.
All Luxon and Levy need to do is hang in and package public Hospitals and their car parks for sale to a USA conglomerate health insurance company like AIG. Something easy like that could indeed be done in an 8 hour week. Dr Levy excellent remuneration is compensation for the public odium attached to eating rats. ACC could be thrown into the mix as a cash inducement for the ultimate buyer
I have read that a number of officials own shares in private hospitals too. I think that we have a real problem because none of our systems are designed for abuses and as you mention, paving roads ahead.
For example, Alan Gibbs, Atlas dude and ACT mega-donor wants everything privatised - hospitals, schools roads.
What I've learned is all their donor networks on the right are tight.
Ouch!!
I'm apoplectic and having conuptions after reading this
Sorry Geoffrey - it is not good. But it's hard to counter.
Stay well though - we need all the people we can get to fix things and spread awareness.
🙏