What is a national health service that does not cater for all citizens of the nation irrespective of their race, ethnicity or background? When we place our lives in the hands of others, we can only hope that they have our best interests at heart and are willing to provide the best possible care despite any of our differences. We place our trust in an institution that has promised to never turn us away in our ailment. It is only recently that I have come to the acknowledgement that the NHS has failed to deliver this promise to those national minorities. We will all encounter the same NHS and we will all long to ensure that we have been treated with the same dignity and respect as the patient beside us. But when we encounter the NHS, we will not be physically, mentally or emotionally at our strongest and that is when we are at the most vulnerable. Those who are weak cannot fight and those that are strong cannot choose to be weak.

The abuse of power is inherent in the treatment of national minorities. I use my own mother as an example, a woman that has always been sceptical of the NHS after she had lost her first child due to medical negligence. My own ailing mother who physically could not call for help had to resort to continuously hitting a piece of equipment on her hospital bed,  in order to alert someone that she was about to faint due to her bleeding for hours. I was shocked to once enter her room to find a dustpan and brush laying there, along with an unswept floor and spoiled food sitting on her counter. This was supposed to be a woman in palliative care, who was promised her last days would be in comfort. A woman who could not move, nor speak, had to endure these distressing events because the NHS had not bothered to treat her with the dignity and respect that she deserved, as not only a citizen of this nation but a human being.

When researching details of the neglect of minorities within the healthcare system, there is not much. However this absence of information is not due to its infrequency, but it is because nobody is reporting it to the appropriate authorities. There is a reason why black women are four times more likely to suffer a miscarriage than white women, but not enough effort is being made to find out why. To treat somebody less than another, especially at a time of extreme vulnerability, is an entirely disturbing act to perform. It brings me great sorrow that my mother fell victim to this, and many mothers, many fathers, many friends will too have to suffer the same injustice, unless something is done. It is time that we stop viewing minorities as separate from the nation, because it is this mentality that allows for the injustice that occurs in national institutions.

Admittedly, the NHS may not be well equipped to provide the best care, but equal care, despite race, ethnicity or background, should be the minimum expectation.