Evening Press Leader

Voters who swept Labour into power did so in the belief that the National Health Service would be safe in its hands. That belief appears to have been misplaced.

Tony Blair and his health secretary Alan Milburn have spent the last week assuring the nation that the health service is coping. Such rhetoric was exposed by the tragic case of Yorkshire woman Mavis Skeet.

Mrs Skeet has cancer of the oesophagus. Five weeks ago she was due to have surgery at Leeds General Infirmary. Disgracefully, the operation was cancelled four times because of a shortage of intensive care beds. Now doctors have told Mrs Skeet that the cancer has spread making surgery impossible. Because of the delays, her illness is now terminal.

An NHS that cannot carry out life-saving surgery because of a shortage of beds is not coping.

Last year we reported the death of Ian Weir, a 38-year-old Darlington father who died of a heart attack during a seven-month wait for a heart bypass operation.

An NHS that allows seriously ill people to die awaiting treatment is not coping.

Then there are the cases of patients being ferried by ambulance 150 miles in the search for urgent hospital treatment. Some have not survived the journey.

An NHS that cannot provide immediate, local intensive care is not coping.

Meanwhile, Britain's most notorious murderers enjoy the promptest medical attention. Both Myra Hindley and Ian Brady have received rapid hospital treatment for their different complaints.

New Labour can no longer blame the Tories for the shocking state of the NHS. This government has been in power for more than two and a half years. And, in the words of Labour life peer and pioneering surgeon Lord Winston, Labour's reorganisation of the health service has been "very bad".

He is right. The NHS is in sickly shape. Labour must take urgent, radical steps to put it back on its feet before anyone else has to suffer like Mavis Skeet.

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