NHS Pirates, reposted. SERCO is only part of our problem

“Illness is neither an indulgence for which people have to pay, nor an offence for which they should be penalised, but a misfortune, the cost of which should be shared by the community” Aneurin Bevan 

“Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wicked of men will do the most wicked of things for the greatest good of everyone.” JM Keynes



Virgin Care leads the way in negating the founding principles of the NHS whilst claiming to promote the greatest good. So I will start with them.
Over the past seven years they have been awarded NHS contracts worth over £2 billion. By this year, they were running over 400 NHS services. 
Virgin Care has two arms to its business in the NHS: primary care services, including GP services and community-based NHS services.
In January 2018 Virgin Care Private was launched, opening its first health and wellbeing centre in Birmingham.This centre provides GP services, specialist consultations, diagnostics and tests on a pay-as-you-go service.
The company targets large contracts containing numerous services in the area of community health and social care. Since 2012 they have won these contracts in over seven UK regions.
When Virgin Care has failed to win contacts it has resorted to legal action. The full amount paid to date to Virgin by you and me as taxpayers could be as high as £2.6 million.
Labour MP Paula Sherriff, revealed that when she worked for Virgin Care the company insisted on “extra consultations before surgery, boosting their profits at the expense of the taxpayer and patient safety”.
The parent company, Virgin Group Holdings Ltd, is registered in the British Virgin Islands. Richard Branson and his family hold a £2.7 billion stake in this offshore, tax-free, tax-haven company.
Virgin is just the tip of the scalpel.
NHS Support Federation, reveals that profit-driven companies such as Bupa, Virgin Care and Care UK have in the last four years won more than 130 NHS service contracts worth £2.6bn to provide NHS services. Dr Mark Porter, of the British Medical Association, said: “These figures show the extent of privatisation in the NHS following the pushing through of the Health and Social Care Act. An act that the government denied loud and long would lead to privatisation, has done exactly that. Enforcing competition has not only fragmented services and compromised the delivery of high-quality care, but it is also diverting vital funding away from frontline services to costly, complicated tendering processes, highlighting just how counterproductive the reorganisation has been.”
At the beginning of 2017 private-sector companies had been invited to bid for 14% more NHS contracts than a year previously. According to the Department of Health accounts, the private sector delivered a total of £8.7bn of NHS services for 2015/16, or around 7.6 per cent of the total NHS budget. These figures exclude GP services, dentistry and community pharmacy.
David Hare, chief executive of the Partners Network, which represents private sector providers, has said there was a slow “evolutionary trajectory” of greater private sector involvement in the NHS.
So who, alongside Richard Branson and his family, are a part of this trajectory? These are the 'privateers' I have discovered. There are others. 32 to date and counting.

Alliance / Lodestone - Diagnostics for the NHS and independent sector
BDO - Commissioning services for the NHS
BMI - You can now choose to have your NHS treatment at a BMI Healthcare hospital
BUPA - The biggest private healthcare company which takes your money and then depends on the NHS to carry out expensive treatments.
Capio - Free family practice services if registered with them.
Capita - IT, patient engagement, HR, payroll, commissioning services.
Cap Gemine – NHS programme management and technical expertise.
Care UK - Day care and homes for elderly. GP services, diagnostics, treatment centres, mental health services learning disability services.
Centene - IT, digital technologies for NHS.
Circle UK - Large community care contracts and is the first private company to run an NHS hospital – Hinchingbrooke in Cambridgeshire.
Classic Care - homecare services.
Diaverum UK Ltd - kidney services in partnership with the NHS.
Exel Europe Ltd - consumer procurables acquired for NHS.
Facilities First LLP - pathology services to NHS Foundation Trusts.

Gemini - IT support for NHS
General Healthcare - a private specialist in fertility treatment.
HCA International - Through US companies Tenet Healthcare and Aspen Healthcare provide “opportunities to work with and support the NHS.
IBM - Electronic staff records services to NHS, payroll, pensions and other human resources functions.
InHealth Group - diagnostics for NHS throughout the UK.
McKesson - IT support
Mouchel - Commissioning services.
Nector Primecare - Home care, care homes, mental health services, children’s services, out-of-hours, dentistry and primary care.
Netcare - Clinics set up iby South African company, which works under contract to the NHS.
Optimum - part of of US United Health Group which works with the NHS to provide services such as contract negotiations and medication management.
Partnership in Care – Working with NHS as provider of secure mental health facilities across the UK. Working with the NHS.
Pathology First LLP - pathology services to NHS Foundation Trusts.
The Practice - 75% owned by US company Centene, providing primary care services and specialist clinical services to GPs.
Priory Group - Provider of acute mental health care, complex care and neuro-rehabilitation services, fostering and care homes.
Ramsay UK - 22 hospitals in the UK delivering both private treatment and care under contract to the NHS 
Serco with an annual turnover in excess of £3 bn, it operates prisons and immigration detention centres, provides support to the military and manages healthcare facilities.

Spite Classic - Second largest private healthcare hospital group in the UK with 37 hospitals; NHS admissions accounting for 25% of its business.
Totally PLC - Working with the NHS including physiotherapy, podiatry, dermatology, referral management services and clinical health coaching.
United Health/Optum - Health needs assessment, GP Commissioning, performance & contract management, Medicines management.

An historical note on pirates: Richard Branson has a home on Necker Island, part of the British Virgin Isles. In the 17th century these islands were a centre of piracy. Yes I know peg-legged, one-eyed, walk-the-plank buccaneers. The truth is the 'pirates' were often escaped black slaves who set up a Pirate's Republic in the area. The Jack Sparrow / Jonny Depp characterisation is myth which has become reality in our times with the arrival of the real Jack Sparrow in the form of Richard Branson.

Redemption Song