HAVING read the disastrous news about cuts to health services in York to facilitate the saving of £24.5 million (Lives at risk, The Press, December 29), I would like to re-emphasise a previous letter of mine regarding the ever-increasing cost of the 2012 Olympics (now forecast to exceed £8 billion and still rising).

The Labour Government is still insisting that this event will benefit the whole country.

I would urge all readers to bombard Parliament with letters demanding that this waste of money be scrapped, and the savings used to refinance the NHS, pensions, schools, provision for the homeless, because this really would benefit the whole nation.

When Labour came to power in 1997, it said that the NHS, pensions and education would only be safe in its hands.

It actually campaigned on a threat to rising retirement ages should the Tories get back into power - a claim the Conservative Government at the time denied and which has now come to fruition under Labour.

Oh, how we reap the seeds we sow.

Tony Taylor, Grassholme, Woodthorpe, York.


MORE cuts for those who need health care (Lives at risk, The Press, December 29). When a person is in pain, or is ill, whatever they are suffering from is giving them pain and discomfort and distress at that time, and they are entitled to be treated medically irrespective of whether this Government says they are ill enough.

Who are these people to judge whether a person is ill enough? How much suffering do people have to endure?

Pain is pain at whatever level, and any pain, especially a constant pain is totally energy-draining and debilitating, and any illness means a person cannot go about their daily business, and treatment should be available for whatever ails a person.

Perhaps it's time this Government treated the primary care trusts as if they were a Third World country, wiped out the debts, and let them start again with a clean slate, instead of being told that various necessary treatments aren't available because they are unaffordable.

Contributions from people's salaries are taken greedily each pay day, with no consideration as to whether these people can afford to lose that money.

A service has been paid for, therefore it should be provided, and the level of pain or illness should not be a deciding factor as to whether or not treatment is given.

Pity our poor GPs, trying to get the best for their patients then being kicked back because some faceless wonder decided the pain scale isn't high enough.

Politicians, get into the real world.

When you're ill, just go to your GP, then be told to wait for as long as it takes because what you have is a minor ailment.

Can you just see it?

Janet S Kitchen, Ashley Park Road, York.