This is from Our NHS, in an article questioning Simon Stevens' commitment to
preventing privatisation of the NHS - and opening it up to transAtlantic
competition under TTIP.
"NHS boss Stevens and the TTIP 'trade' lobbyists who threaten our NHS "
https://www.opendemocracy.net/ournhs/caroline-molloy/nhs-boss-stevens-and-tt
ip-lobbyists
It includes this among a great deal else.
"The AHC say US trade negotiators must demand "full elimination of tariffs
on all health goods", from pharmaceuticals to furniture.
But that's just for starters. "Non-tariff barriers... generally appearing as
regulatory policies" are "the principal barrier...powerful obstacles", they
say.
So the AHC demands "regulations to help generate competition", adding:
"Trade agreements are an opportunity to address these problems; further open
healthcare services markets; impose disciplines on regulatory authority,
including rules for technical standards and recognition of qualifications;
and ensure that trade in health care services will reach its extraordinarily
large potential." "
I am interested in the "rules for technical standards and recognition of
qualifications": does anyone know whether professional qualifications and
regulators are part of the trade deal?
Sounds odd if so - and even odder if AHC thinks they could be.
Mary Hawking
Retired from NHS on 31.3.13 because of the Health and Social Care Act 2012
"thinking - independent thinking - is to humans as swimming is to cats: we
can do it if we really have to." Mark Earles on Radio 4
blog http://maryhawking.wordpress.com/ And Fred!
http://primaryhealthinfo.wordpress.com/2013/11/02/freds-saying-you-just-dont
-get-it/
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