Some realities in life are too obvious to need constant repetition. Here are a couple of chestnuts known to mankind since the days of the caveman. One: human beings go through an ageing process and their bodily health decays. Two: even healthy human beings can be afflicted with illness that needs treatment.

This isn’t rocket science. That is why our recent forebears established an NHS free at the point of use and for 70 years we’ve all been the happier for it. Anyone who doubts that should consider the cost of comprehensive private health insurance and whether their budgets could stretch that far for all family members. It’s a sobering thought.

However, it appears the government have their own peculiar medicine for the NHS. A course of treatment reminiscent of Medieval quacks attaching a dozen leeches to suck blood from the long-suffering patient. Namely, years of deliberate underfunding and insufficient resources.

Last week the people of York received a shocking revelation. Patrick Crowley, chief executive of York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, stated in an email to executive board and senior managers that they are about to ‘run out of cash’.

Is it just me who blinked in disbelief when they read that? But no, the situation is quite real. The Trust is running a deficit of £13.8 million and have to borrow money to make sure it can fulfil its basic functions. On a regional level, The Vale of York Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), covering York, Selby, Tadcaster, Easingwold and parts of East Yorkshire including Pocklington, is predicted to run a deficit next year of £44.1 million and £53.9 million by 2018/19.

How can we explain this crisis? One argument often heard is that we have an ageing population, we’re all living longer and our senior citizens are draining the system dry. Or we are told there is an endless treasure house of ‘efficiency savings’, because the public sector is inherently inefficient whereas the pursuit of private profit, almost miraculously, somehow leads to greater efficiency and benefits for the ‘consumer’.

I believe that as a society – and local community – we cannot afford to pay lip service to this nonsense any longer. Let’s be clear: starving the NHS of the money ordinary citizens pay as taxes, coupled with asset-stripping and shameless privatisation, is already bearing an unacceptable human cost.

The government’s own figures recently revealed more than four million patients are waiting for planned NHS surgery, the highest level since records began in 2007. This isn’t an abstract number we’re talking about, but people’s essential happiness and well-being. Anyone who has suffered chronic pain knows that swift treatment is not a luxury. Early interventions can also be hugely cost effective, preventing much more expensive treatment being required once an illness or condition has worsened.

Such shameful and avoidable waiting times for surgery also impact families heavily. Unemployment can result, with knock on effects of homelessness and harsh choices to meet basic household bills. In addition, family members are often forced into the role of carers while sick relatives wait and wait for operations that are all too often cancelled due to a shortage of staff and beds.

This is not efficiency. Nor is the government’s policy of deliberate underfunding remotely efficient when it comes to staffing. Low pay is already forcing dedicated care workers to leave the jobs they love. This creates an added layer of cost in hospitals due to ‘bed-blocking’.

In addition, years of under investment in training home-grown doctors is now reaching its predictable conclusion. Last week NHS England announced plans to spend £100m bringing in up to 3,000 GPs from abroad to help alleviate serious shortages that have left surgeries struggling to run properly. Recruitment agencies will be given about £20,000 for each GP they succeed in placing in a family doctor practice in England, money that should be spent on nurses, medicine and equipment.

Britain is one of the wealthiest countries in the world. We should all say enough is enough to the irresponsible, scandalous and incompetent underfunding of the NHS.