This is International Nurses Day.
It is appropriately held on Florence Nightingale’s birthday, the social reformer and founder of modern nursing, whose work saved the lives of thousands of British soldiers in the Crimean War, through cleanliness and good practice. Perhaps we need another Florence Nightingale to organise nursing for the future.
We all know the National Health Service is struggling through lack of staff and funds. It still provides a wonderful service, considering the restrictions under which it survives, but the warning creaks have been getting louder, year by year.
There is a such a chronic shortage of homegrown nurses, for instance, that one in four new nurses in hospitals last year came from abroad, according to the Nursing and Midwifery Council.
The shortfall follows cuts in the numbers of training places in each year under the coalition government. As a result, fewer “homegrown” nurses are coming through the system at a time when hospitals are under pressure to hire more than ever to care for the growing number of elderly patients and overall growth in the UK population.
Fact one: people are living longer. The number of Britons living to 90 or more has trebled in the last 30 years. The Office for National Statistics said 0.8% of the population had reached 90 last year - that’s 527,240. Centenarians have also increased over the same period, from 3,040 to 13,780. Average age of death is 79 for men and 81 for women and getting older every year. For the first time in history, Britain’s over 65s now outnumber people under the age of 16.
This means there are four people of working age supporting each pensioner in Britain, which is an equation to which I have given careful thought: if I’m to be supported by four people, can I please have Sir Richard Branson, Bernie Ecclestone, Sir Philip Green and the Sixth Duke of Westminster. They’re all billionaires so they won’t feel the pinch and they might slip me a few bob extra at Christmas.
By 2035 – that’s only 20 years away – the figures are expected to be 2.5 workers supporting one pensioner. By 2050, it will be down to just two. Pick yours carefully.
Pensions expert Tom McPhail said improved life expectancy means having to work to a later age and saving more for retirement. Retirement? What’s retirement? I, and plenty like me, are still working.
Fact two: people are getting fatter. The nursing problem will potentially get worse because the population of the Western world is putting weight on. The World Health Organisation says Europe will be overwhelmed by an obesity crisis that will result in a weight explosion. Which puts me in mind of Monty Python’s exploding Mr Creosote and you wouldn’t want to be in the vicinity when that happens. A fanciful concept? Not in America, where the sight of Mr and Mrs Obesity and their overweight children walking into an All You Can Eat restaurant, has had me change tables just in case.
Alright, I’m exaggerating, but the WHO says two thirds of the UK’s adults will be overweight in 15 years time. A third of them will be obese. Before long, most of the population won’t be able to move without help.
Dr Laura Webber of the UK Health Forum, who co-led the research, says: “Our study presents a worrying picture of rising obesity. Policies to reverse this trend are urgently needed. Although there is no silver bullet for tackling the epidemic, governments must do more to restrict unhealthy food marketing and make healthy food more affordable.”
Fact three: in 30 years time, medical science will have cured more diseases and be keeping us alive even longer, machines will operate in automated factories, robots will do everything from cut the grass to cook the dinner and drones will be buzzing around the skies delivering Tesco groceries, Sports Direct track suits (extra large) and fast food meals (and yes, that’s double fries with that, thank you).
In a scenario that is tilting on the edge of dystopian, nurses will be needed more than ever to look after all those trapped in obesity and old age, to help them rise in the morning and sit them comfortably in front of their wall-screen 3D television sets within reach of the next Happy Meal or Family Bucket of Chicken. But what if we still don’t have enough to go around?
The alternative might be the silver bullet they had in Logan’s Run, the award winning 1976 sci fi film, starring Michael York and Jenny Agutter, where the balance between resources and population was maintained by an annual cull when people reached a certain age. Those who didn’t agree, made a run for it.
I’m getting on a bit to make a run for it, even with Jenny Agutter. Let’s hope we have enough nurses by then.
