Norman Lamb rattled by 'zombie' attack on health and care policy | David Brindle

Norman Lamb rattled by 'zombie' attack on health and care policy | David Brindle The care minister's plan for a £5bn joint NHS and social care fund to be used for personal budgets is doomed unless thinking changes

You never know where you are with zombies. So care and support minister Norman Lamb might have thought twice when it was put to him that doctors were likening his pet policy to an animated corpse. That he didn't, but chose instead to let rip, speaks volumes about the tension surrounding the health and social care interface.

Lamb was speaking at the annual conference of the School for Social Care Research and had said he wanted to see "great chunks" of NHS funds turned over to personal health budgets for people living with long-term conditions. A questioner told him that at another event, packed with health professionals, a show of hands had gone overwhelmingly against the idea of patients using budgets to arrange their own care. One eminent medic at the event had described the policy as an "intellectual zombie", an "ideologically driven dead idea still moving" that needed putting out of its misery.Continue reading... The Guardian