I cannot make any sense of it all. How can two GPs be expected to provide professional out-of-hours medical cover for an entire county? It’s been reported that this is sometimes the level of cover provided in Suffolk.
When my mother-in-law was dying last year, we called the out-of-hours emergency number and were surprised when she was visited at her home in Cambridgeshire by a doctor from Suffolk. From memory, he was based in Bury St Edmunds. Where were the doctors from Cambridgeshire? At least it was better than having someone who had just flown in from Germany and could barely speak English.
Best thing is not be sick after 5pm and during weekends. Do you know where your out-of-hours doctor comes from?
If he can save life, I don’t care where he comes from. If my friends/relations die, I do.
You’re right – coming from another country within the European Union doesn’t garantee that somebody can provide services in Britain.
For example, I got on a bus today, and asked the driver, an Eastern European, where exactly in a particular village he was stopping. He couldn’t answer me – I know I’ve got a Scottish accent, but it’s something less than broad after living in England for so long. That’s not the worst of it – another passenger came on who didn’t have English as his first language, pointing at a map and asking about a particular stop: the driver was completely unable to communicate with him.
But a doctor? The Ubani case beggars belief. If somebody with poor English can’t provide a basic service as a bus driver, how can we expect them to function as a doctor?
I don’t know where from but I do know that in her distress in the middle of the night the ambulance and paramedics arrived within 10 minutes.
From which she was rushed into hospital.