Letter: Never Mind the Future, We Need More GP Provision Now

Published on: 7 Oct, 2019
Updated on: 7 Oct, 2019

From George Potter

Lib Dem borough councillor for Burpham

The article: Five Guildford GP Surgeries Targeted For Possible Closure In Health Services Revamp highlights the madness of current GP provision in Guildford and what is, to my mind, a disturbing level of complacency on the part of the Guildford and Waverley Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG).

We have five surgeries potentially facing closure and other surgeries which have already closed their doors to new patients. Meanwhile, in Burpham, we have a surgery with a fantastic patient satisfaction rating which is struggling to get support from the CCG to stay open.

Elsewhere, our CCG reopened a surgery in temporary premises within days after it was burned down in a fire but here in Guildford the CCG seems content to allow a slow-motion disaster in GP provision to unfold by claiming that all the potential closures are matters for the practices themselves and that (in the face of all evidence to the contrary) there’s plenty of capacity in the system to cope with patients having to move practices.

There’s a lot of talk about the need to ensure any new housing developments come with the health infrastructure to support them but it seems that right now we’re on the verge of losing the health infrastructure to support even our existing population.