Our once-envied National Health Service is becoming an expensive joke. It's enough to make you sick | Mark Dolan

You may need, a lie-down, after hearing this. And some smelling, salts. The Telegraph report, that the NHS, is paying six-figure salaries, to 3,500 managers.

Statistics, from the Department of Health, and Social Care, also show, that the number of senior bureaucrats, employed by the service, has risen, by over 16%, in just, three years. There are now, over 36 and a half thousand bureaucrats, within the system, up from 33 thousand, in December 2019.

How can our health, service, which is paid from the public purse – your money and mine –sleep-walk, into hiring thousands more people on huge, six-figure salaries? There aren't too many examples in the private sector, of people being recruited, and the wage bill exploding, accidentally, or without anyone, really noticing. In the private sector, the wage bill doesn’t swell, automatically. But when you and I, are paying for it, it’s another story. As with, the entirety of the public sector, when its taxpayers' money, we're always, taken for mugs.

We know about, the diabolical, waste in the health, service – with hospital trusts, paying over the odds for a packet of paracetamol, that you can get, for 50p at Morrisons. There are contractors, charging a small fortune, to change, a lightbulb, or replace, a carpet tile. And don't get me started, on diversity, officers, for the most diverse, workforce, on God's earth.

The public sector, has a problem, with cash. Whilst, private companies, work, ruthlessly, to police, their incomings and outgoings, with the very survival of the business, dependent, on the balance sheet and the bottom line, in the public sector, when it's taxpayers’ money, it's money, no, object. It's often boasted, that the NHS, is the biggest employer, in Europe. Why is that, a boast? That is, a diabolical, admission, of the service’s, wild inefficiency. It should treat more, people and employ fewer. Yes, we need, more doctors and nurses. But pen-pushing, middle managers? Not so much.

Whoever wins, the next election must conduct, an almighty war on waste, and the best place, to start, is these, fat cat salaries, for NHS managers, who have presided, over a service, which is getting, both MORE expensive and WORSE by the day. And these NHS managers, as part of, the leadership, of our health service, were behind the NHS's, in MY view, disastrous, response to Covid, in which it focused, on the containment, of a seasonal, respiratory virus, at the expense, of far worse, illnesses, like, cancer, type two, diabetes and dementia.

Even now, when you go into an NHS hospital, they're still drinking, the Covid cool-aid, with ridiculous, signs for social distancing, plastic screens everywhere, and half the staff, wearing those filthy, worthless face rags. I hasten to add, many of them, just wear them, on their chin, or below their nose. Follow the science.

With mask mandates, with a focus on containing the spread of Covid, within hospital settings, the NHS would argue, they were trying to save, lives, and prevent, the service, from being, overwhelmed. Well, I beg, to differ, as perfectly healthy, doctors and nurses, were forced to stay at home, for weeks on end, during the pingdemic, when their phone alerted them after they’d been in contact, with someone - that horror of horrors - had tested positive, for Covid. Yes a potentially, nasty virus, but one, mild and non-fatal, to almost everyone. Well thanks to, the Covid hysteria, encouraged, by fat-cat, NHS middle management, the NHS, is certainly overwhelmed, now.

These six-figure, middle managers, are responsible, for a waiting list, of over 7 million people, and a health system, on the verge of collapse. Please don't mention money, given the fact, that the health service, is estimated, to cost each household, £13,000 a year. I'm not saying this is a GOOD thing, but you could pay a FRACTION of that, to go private. NHS managers have presided, over a service, in which the population, is getting ILLER, and fatter, by the decade. Until you tackle, public health, and obesity - which is a gateway drug, to every other ILLNESS, you can think of - the service, will never, be viable. The nurses, and doctors, are great, but the once-envied, National HEALTH Service, is becoming, an expensive joke. It's enough to make you SICK.