The cure for an ailing, ageing NHS is to cut it down to size | Simon Jenkins

Since its nationalisation, the health service has defied sensible pruning. Losing 24,000 backroom staff would be a start

Alfred, 69, "was left sleeping in a chair with dried blood on him … his clothes were not changed … soaked in urine … discharged when too weak to walk … had a heart attack on the way home". Mr D was so dehydrated at Bolton General Hospital "that his tongue was like a piece of dried leather". Mrs R "had no bath or shower in 13 weeks at Southampton hospital and was left for...