End-of-life charities have reiterated their demands for the government to “fix” palliative care funding and provision across the country, amidst renewed attempts to introduce an assisted dying law.
As MPs prepare to debate and vote on Friday on legislation proposing to legalise assisted dying for terminally ill adults in England and Wales, campaigners insist “the need for more urgent and ambitious action to fix end-of-life care could not be clearer”.
While Marie Curie, Hospice UK and St Christopher’s hospice charity take a neutral stance on assisted dying itself, they have repeatedly warned that the quality and accessibility of palliative care remains extremely patchy nationwide, with the sector severely underfunded.
Hospice UK chief executive Toby Porter branded it “unsanctionable that someone might even consider an assisted death in the future because they fear they won’t get the pain relief or other care they and their loved ones need at the end of their lives”.
He said despite general agreement from both supporters and opponents to the legislation of the need to fix hospice funding “the reality is that over the nearly two years since this Bill was first debated by MPs, the opposite as happened”.
He added: “Nationwide, hospice services are shrinking, beds are closing and community hospice visits are falling.
“It’s now harder than ever before for people to get the end-of-the-life care they need.”
Marie Curie has written an open letter to Prime Minister Andy Burnham insisting the UK “can and must do better than this”.
Matthew Reed, the charity’s chief executive, said: “For far too many people today, experiences of the end of life are marked not by care and dignity, but by avoidable pain, poverty, and significant uncertainty around where to turn for help.
“Our recent research identifies that nearly one in three dying people have unmet palliative care needs.
“That equates to over 200,000 people across the UK each year not receiving the care and support they need at the end of their lives.
“With our population ageing, without additional significant intervention, this figure will only grow.”
Mr Burnham, who has already confirmed he will abstain from the vote, so as not to “unduly influence the debate”, gave some insight into his view on the issue shortly after becoming PM in July when he said he believed the funding of palliative care needs to be fixed before consideration can be given to legalising assisted dying.
Polling for the Press Association by Ipsos, published earlier this week, found 34% of more than 1,100 people aged 16-75 surveyed at the end of August said assisting dying should be made legal only if it is accompanied by additional investment in state-funded end-of-life care.
Meanwhile, three in 10 (30%) said they agreed with the statement that assisted dying should be made legal, even without extra investment in this kind of care.
Steve Smith, chief executive of St Christopher’s, said current hospice funding is “not sustainable”.
He added: “Nearly 60% of hospices have made or are considering cuts to frontline services, while demand continues to rise.
“At St Christopher’s, demand in south London has increased by nearly 50% over the past six years, and our teams completed 13% more home visits in the last year alone.”
He argued that “charitable giving cannot substitute for a fair, sustainable national funding settlement”.
No matter which way the vote goes, he called for investment in hospices to be “treated as an urgent priority”
He added: “The government should fully fund specialist palliative care commissioned by the NHS, provide fair multi-year contracts that rise with costs, establish consistent funding across the country and enable hospices to match NHS pay awards.
Palliative care is described by the NHS as the management of pain and other distressing symptoms which should be available as soon as someone first learns they have a life-limiting or terminal illness, while end-of-life care is a form of palliative care given when someone is close to death.
Source: UK Politics - www.independent.co.uk
