The NHS is in danger. The challenges of universalism.
Residential seminar – Health policy itineraries 6-8 September 2023 (San Domenico, Fiesole)
edited by the Laboratory on Health and Healthcare, with the collaboration of Health Fundamental Law, International Health, Lunaria
After almost 10 years of austerity, restrictions and definancing, dictated by neoliberal policies, the National Health Service has arrived exhausted at the appointment with the COVID-19 pandemic. Italy has paid a very high price in lives – both in the first and in the second wave – due to the general unpreparedness of its health system for a pandemic event, the poverty of human and organizational resources, particularly in the care sectors primary care and preventive services.
Could this shock have been an opportunity to strengthen the system both in terms of human resources and that of building and technological structures (and a hand in this sense has been extended to us from Europe), the opportunity to profoundly innovate a strategic sector of our NHS such as that of family medicine and primary care.
All of this was not, it did not happen. Just take a look at the table on public health expenditure 2022-2025 to realize that the trend over the next few years will be one of further progressive definancing of the NHS and a strong penalization of the public service.
With the new government, which has inherited – without getting involved – this situation, further threats are gathering on the future of the NHS: the differentiated autonomy of the Regions and the expectation of implementing a flat tax regime for all within 5 years. It is evident that we are faced with an inclined plane destined to produce the complete dissolution of the NHS, as it was conceived at the time of its establishment: universalistic, public, free. The serious and surprising thing is the substantial indifference, or rather perhaps the resignation, of citizens, operators, political and trade union forces in the face of what is happening. Waiting for someone to formally announce one day that the glorious history of the NHS – universal, public, free – is over. But we are convinced that, as Antonio Gramsci wrote, “even when all is or seems lost, one must calmly get back to work, starting over from the beginning”.
“We are not indifferent, we do not resign ourselves”. This could be the subtitle of the Health Policy Days to be held at the CISL Study, Research and Training Centre, on the hill that rises from Florence towards Fiesole, near San Domenico, from Wednesday 6 to Friday 8 September 2023, entitled “The NHS it is in danger. The challenge of universalism”.
Three days of study, reflection and discussion. Starting from the intersection of exogenous and endogenous causes that have produced the progressive erosion of the welfare state in recent decades and the consequent dismantling of the NHS. The analysis will then focus on two specific topics:
- The public-private relationship, the privatization of health services, the development of the private insurance sector;
- Growing socio-economic inequalities produce inequalities in health. Is the SSN able to mitigate them or, conversely, accentuate them?
The residential Study Days are based on a few frontal interventions (all having preparatory documents available before the event) and a lot of group work with the aim of producing and sharing proposals that represent a boost to awakening, reflection and discussion publishes on a topic of vital importance: the survival of the NHS: universal, public, free.
PLAN
The NHS is in danger. The challenges of universalism
6-8 September 2023, San Domenico di Fiesole
Cisl Study Research and Training Center – Studium Srl
Via della Piazzuola, 71 – 50133 Florence –
Wednesday 6 September 2023
h 12 Introduction
13-14h break
h 14-18.30 Universalism in healthcare and the transformations of welfare in Europe
Thursday 7 September 2023
h 9-13 Public and private in healthcare
1 pm break
h 14-18.30 Inequalities in health
Friday 8 September 2023
Round table: What future for public health services
The Study Days are open to 25 “residential” places (which include accommodation in a single room for two nights) and to 15 “non-residential” places.
Registrations are open until May 25, bearing in mind that these will be accepted according to the order of time of the application.
- Registration fee as a resident, including participation in the meeting, accommodation in a single room for two nights (Wednesday and Thursday), breakfast, lunch on Wednesday and Thursday: Three hundred euros (300.00).
- Registration fee as a NON-resident, including participation in the meeting, lunch on Wednesday and Thursday: Euro one hundred (100.00).
- For students, postgraduates and researchers, Registration fee as a resident, including participation in the meeting, accommodation in a single room for two nights (Wednesday and Thursday), breakfast, lunch on Wednesday and Thursday: Two hundred euros (200.00).
Request form for participation in the Seminar Routes of health policies
The cover photo is taken from Guido Carocci, The environs of FlorenceFlorence, Galletti and Cocci, 1906