Book Review:
John Lister – Wealth versus Health; Trump’s Global War on Health and Science
Reviewed by John Puntis, Co Chair Keep Our NHS Public
Published as a paperback by Bite-Sized Books: available via KONP website and at https://tinyurl.com/vzdys8py
What happens to health care when a narcissistic and authoritarian member of a rich elite comes to power and starts to implement policies aimed at enriching a clique of business buddies including high finance, big tech, real estate and fossil fuels? This book spells out the answer to that question in excruciating and forensic detail, focusing mainly on the vindictive chaos unleashed by Donald Trump’s second term as president. The consequences are already far reaching, spreading beyond the US and outwards to the rest of the world.
This makes the book sharply relevant to those of us living in Britain, where an ascendant Reform UK rubbishes climate change (the single biggest threat to public health), wants to increase privatisation of healthcare, change the NHS funding model, exit from the World Health Organisation, and withdraw existing indefinite leave to remain for migrant workers endangering hundreds of thousands of health and care staff and their families, among many others.
Trump’s programme is aligned with the reactionary Project 2025, designed by the ‘Heritage Foundation’ to reshape the federal government of the US and consolidate executive power in favour of right-wing policies. All aspects of publicly provided care are under attack in order to justify tax cuts for the most wealthy. The consequences are likely to be staggering – cuts to Medicaid alone will leave 15 million people without health cover and put 300 rural hospitals and 600 nursing homes at risk of closure. Twenty two million families will lose some or all of their benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programme.
Making an anti-vax crank who takes his grandchildren swimming in raw sewage (Robert F. Kennedy Jr.) Health Secretary has been aptly described as ‘woo-woo meets MAGA’. It is on a par with the ketamine-gulping, ecstasy-fuelled, chainsaw-wielding, billionaire Elon Musk being let loose on the US aid budget. This created the unedifying spectacle of ‘the world’s richest man killing the world’s poorest children’.
In this war against the poor, the ‘butchers bill’ (human cost) will be immense – an estimated 15.2 million deaths from AIDS, 2.2 million from TB, and 7.9 million preventable deaths in children. Add to this huge job losses and dismantling of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a tsunami of cuts in research grants including cancer, tearing up environmental protections and denying climate change. The latter even involves destruction of NASA’s pesky climate research satellites since these collect data that is anathema to Trump and his climate change denying accomplices. Throw into the mix such enlightened policies as a possible lifting of the ban on asbestos, questioning the safety and effectiveness of fluoride in preventing dental decay, allowing dangerous pesticides to be used without the public knowing of their dangers, and the madness of the whole endeavour becomes even more stark.
After John Lister’s devastating account, I could only agree with former State Department Assistant Secretary Eric Schwartz, when he said “I struggle for adjectives to adequately describe the horrors that this administration has visited on the world”. This well referenced book should make you weep for the American people, together with the poor and sick in many countries now deprived of US aid (compounded, it must be said, by the actions of our own government). If it makes your blood boil, let it also be a call to action. We should take inspiration from those who have been brave enough to fight back against the manifest heartlessness of Trump and his allies, with community solidarity, public demonstrations, advocacy and legal challenges. We can hope that mass popular outrage will in time be Trump’s nemesis, his memory reduced to a fragmentary inscription displayed in the Smithsonian museum (now compelled to celebrate ‘American greatness’): ‘My name is Trump, king of kings, look on my works ye mighty and despair’.
John Puntis, Co Chair Keep Our NHS Public
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