Imagine Boris saying this…

When I heard what Mark Drakeford had said, I was amazed. I’m absolutely sure he was speaking the truth, but to actually say it……

Until a couple of years ago spent many hours in A&E due to heart problems and seizures. Once spent from 5pm until 4pm the following day in A&E during Covid early days. No hot drink ,air conditioning on full this was winter time so we couldn't have blankets .
No one was drunk just ill.

But anyone coming in handcuffs with 2 police officers was always jumped to the front of the queue every time I was waiting.

But the nurses and doctors worked their socks off and have nothing be gratitude for the way I was treated in very difficult circumstances. Yes I had to wait but they helped me and that's what counts.

I have nothing be praise for the healthcare I get here . I moved to the north west in 2019. My old GP miss diagnosed my heart condition and never sent me to see a cardiologist but my new GP did and thanks to him know what's wrong and getting treatment.

Also my old neurologist could have done what my new neurologist has done but didn't. I now know what I was born with and on treatment .

Healthcare is a postcode lottery.and it's due to the health authority in your area .

I know this has veered from OP's start but this is my experience.

It depends which part of the country you live in. Up here in the North West, there is a pub culture. People drink until they are blotto and many end up in an ambulance.

If you have been unlucky enough to end up in A&E, you will soon become aware that it isn’t just for broken legs, heart attacks etc, but broken minds and addictions as well. It is part of the human fragility. That is what the NHS does.

Cares for all.

I am not sure what point he was making. The link between alcohol and injuries/violence is not a surprise surely.

Panthlas - maybe you should just tell people what you want us to say? You set it up as a discussion so not a "only reply if you concur" exercise. I think maybe you wanted one reaction and have got another...

And can you tell me where the words probably benefited from universal credit due to low pay came from please? And why shouldn't any government explain themselves to all the electorate when asked?

Regarding the main point - Johnson (and NOT the others discussed) is exactly the sort of person who may well have personal experience of drinking himself to oblivion. It's easy to think of him needing assistance from one of our emergency services - his public persona is of the sort that it's easy to imagine him stuck up a tree, in a fence, being "drunk and disorderly" or so sick he is taken to A&E. It is his own character that made the shocking sight of him at that airport in Italy after his meeting with Lebedev no shock at all!

Apologies Pantglas2 - appear to have written "Panthlas"

Having worked as a Health care professional our team are regularly called to A&E to help assess patients, some occasionally drunk , it's definitely true why hide that fact? That's why you often see Police in A&E.
As well as Drunks there are the OD's.
I clearly remember, one chap who had taken drugs who decided to try and stab himself in the heart, he missed but I was the Echocardiographer who tried to scan him to assess what damage he had done. The team around him trying to sort out this man was a significant number, as he was still high and thrashing around, it was like trying to assess a moving target. Those who were trying to help, get him calm and stable were all being kept away from assessment of others in A & E.
But that's life now in Emergency departments throughout the UK and probably most of the world?

I agree with Drakeford on the situation with drunks taking up too much time in A & E but it doesn't excuse the state of the NHS in Wales. I live in North Wales and dread getting ill.

In answer to the question, Boris would have said it far more succinctly!

On one unmentionable occasion, a Saturday night, my school age son ended up being taken to A & E by ambulance because he had over indulged. I remember tearing to the hospital, and when he cried to say he was sorry for worrying me, I said, "It doesn't matter." I will never forget the quite nasty rollicking I received from the ambulance woman - how someone else could be dyng in his place. The doctor in the department came out from a cubicle and severely reprimanded her, saying the NHS was there fir everyone and she might not know the full story of the patient.
I am pleased no one should be judgmental about anyone. I'm surprised Mark Drakeford said this.

It's a bit like saying there are people using hospital beds who have had a car accident, or broken their leg skiing, we have a society where it is legal to ski, drink and drive cars (just not all 3 together!), what in earth does he suggest we do.

Given that this only applies to A&E, and normally across the weekends, and is true, I don’t think it’s in any way helpful and really has virtually zero effect on waiting lists for surgery and consultant referrals

Casdon

Callistemon21

I wish he'd been sitting in a packed Welsh A&E with DH and me (13 hours, fast-tracked). I'm sure there were people there who could have been dealt with elsewhere and others with MH problems. One man was abusive but I don't think he was drunk, he was a regular with MH problems.
I'm sure it happens; the Consultant said some were there were "the regulars" but most people have genuine reasons to be there.

Sitting in the MAU for 10 hours for assessments, I was told by some patients there that they'd been waiting in there, sleeping on bench seats, for 3 of days, waiting for a bed.

Yes, mental health issues are another big issue for A&E staff, very time consuming and with no immediate support from mental health services, which are also severely stretched. Add to that no acute beds for admissions, and a high level of abuse of staff by patients and relatives/friends, and there’s a perfect storm. I don’t know how the staff or the patients who are waiting with serious conditions cope with it.

The reason there are so many people with MH problems in A&E is that they and their families know that they will get a MH assessment there by trained MH nurses..
and then possibly be fast tracked into the MH service.. it's been going on for years.. As we know MH services are grossly understaffed and underfunded and it can take along time even for the Crisis Teams to see someone..

Well, one girl we chatted to wasn't being fast-tracked. She claimed to have been there for three days (she went home for a decent sleep one night).
She was a regular, from what she said.

But anyone coming in handcuffs with 2 police officers was always jumped to the front of the queue every time I was waiting.
There was a prisoner there with two warders when we were there. Suspected heart attack. I don't know how long they were there but that was taking two warders out of the system for that time so the sooner the prisoner was seen the better really. He was fine btw.

I had to take our four year old GS to A & E yesterday. I rang 111 who forwarded his details to the receptionist.

He was seen, checked over, wound glued and we were back in the car in under 35 minutes.

I may have been lucky, I have nothing but praise for his treatment.

Callistemon21

Well, one girl we chatted to wasn't being fast-tracked. She claimed to have been there for three days (she went home for a decent sleep one night).
She was a regular, from what she said.

Yes that's why I said possibly.. There are always the regulars...ie not in real crisis

When we left at about midnight the waiting room was still packed, with people standing. ☹

Well, apparently it certainly is a thing - a niece of dh is an A&E consultant in a very busy city hospital.
That does not detract from the fact that waiting times in many A&E depts. are much too long

Perhaps people who end up in A&E purely because they’re drunk, should be fined - enough to make it a deterrent.

AFAIK there’s still an offence of being ‘drunk and disorderly’ - how about whacking up fines for that, too? If anyone still does get fined, that is.
IMO there’s far too much tolerance of drunken, yobbish behaviour in the U.K.

Perhaps people who end up in A&E purely because they’re drunk, should be fined - enough to make it a deterrent.
Perhaps 3 strikes, then a fine, (if no one had got to the bottom of the problem), would be fair.

Some A&E patients are there because they have given up on the GP or were signposted by 111 - or in our case recently, just told to go there by the GP's surgery receptionist!