Health protesters are set to march against plans that will see £641m lost from the North East’s NHS services over the next five years.
The Sustainability and Transformation Plan (STP) for Northumberland, Tyne and Wear, and North Durham is one of 44 plans being developed across the country.
It aims to ensure the continued safe provision of local healthcare services while plugging a funding gap that is feared to rise to £641m by 2021.The draft STP was published in November 2016 by the local NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs). But it has come under fire from campaigners saying the plan has been “cloaked in secrecy” and lacks detail on how the drastic savings will actually be achieved.
On Saturday the Keep Our NHS Public North East group will stage a rally to protest “the severe under-funding of the NHS” and the negative impact they say the STP will have on local health services.
Speakers at the rally will include local MPs Emma Lewell-Buck of South Shields and Dave Anderson of Blaydon.
Full story in Chronicle Live, 1 February 2017