Hope

Clock in, clock out,
wheel in, wheel out,
breathe in, breath out,
don't shout, don't pout.

Families in great distress,
lovers lost, in blood and mess,
torn, forlorn, depressed with stress,
Save Our Souls, and NHS*.

Run up, run down,
survive, don't drown,
a smile, a frown,
in theatre gown.

Disinfected wards of soap
hanging by a thread, not rope,
underfunded, going broke,
Let us heal, we offer hope!

Cradle and grave,
fight on and save,
the weak the brave;
great public slave.

(20 lines)

Britain is not unique in providing a public health service. Our *National Health Service is "The world’s largest publicly funded health service. It is also one of the most efficient, most egalitarian and most comprehensive."1 But, like any large organisation, it can be bogged down with bureaucracy. It doesn't work well when number crunching, and why should it? People are the bottom line, not mathematics.

Footnotes
1  http://www.nhs.uk/aboutnhs/Pages/About.aspx