Brexit would jeopardise the lives of 30,000 cancer patients, mental health services, drugs and day-to-day healthcare?
Brexit would jeopardise the lives of 30,000 cancer patients, mental health services, drugs and day-to-day healthcare?
Leaving the EU would jeopardise the lives of 30,000 cancer patients, mental health services, drugs and day-to-day healthcare in the UK, the head of NHS England warned today.
Simon Stevens said a Brexit vote would be ‘very dangerous’ for the NHS because it would send the economy into a ‘tailspin’, which would subsequently starve the health service of essential funding.
He also said the EU’s open borders was vital to fill jobs in the NHS and Brexit could trigger a recruitment crisis as some of the 130,000 European doctors, nurses and care workers could quit the UK if Britain votes to leave in the June 23 referendum.
Mr Stevens echoed warnings from two of his predecessors – Lord Crisp and Sir David Nicholson – who said the already ‘fragile’ NHS would suffer heavily from the ‘economic leap in the dark’ of a vote to quit the EU.
His dramatic intervention this morning is a controversial move because his role as chief executive of NHS England is meant to make him impartial during election campaigns.
Brexit campaigners immediately hit back, blaming Mr Stevens for making a ‘very considerable mess’ of the NHS and claimed the biggest danger to Britain’s health service was staying in the EU.
The Vote Leave campaign argues that were Britain to leave the EU, the Government could spend the £350 million it currently sends to Brussels each week on plugging funding gaps in the NHS.
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