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First-ever baby born under the NHS reflects on 70 years of care


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BORN one minute after midnight on July 5, 1948, Aneira Thomas was the very first National Health Service special delivery.

Her mum Edna had been in labour for 18 hours but held on so her baby would be born on that historic day — and it meant the state, not her, paid the midwives’ fee of one shilling and sixpence – 7½p in today’s money.

Edna named her daughter after the founder of the NHS, Labour Health Minister Aneurin Bevan. On Thursday the NHS will, like Aneira, celebrate turning 70.

“My mum always said to people, ‘This is Nye, my NHS baby,’” said Aneira. It is why she jokes that she is the “NHS pin-up girl”.

Seven decades after Aneira’s birth in Amman Valley hospital, Ammanford, Cardiganshire, the health service is the world’s fifth-biggest employer. But its resources are being stretched by an aging population.

Aneira, who works as an NHS mental health nurse, says: “We’ve had a crisis in funding for a long time.

“You can’t blame people living longer lives because that was always the intention from the start.”

And she fears the NHS is wasting resources. She said: “It’s fantastic what science has done, the advances in medicine, but I feel there is so much misuse.

“There seems to be plenty of managers but not enough management.

“A lady came up to me in Tesco the other day and said, ‘I work in a pharmacy and it’s my job to dispose of all the unused drugs that come back and it runs into millions. There is such waste’.

“I’ve read there are calls by some GPs to charge £25 for an appointment. Well, that incenses me. It has to be equality for all, not reserved for the privileged. We can’t go back to how it was in the 1930s.”

Aneira, the youngest of seven children and the first in her family to be born in a hospital, knows all too well how the NHS transformed ordinary people’s lives.

Long before she was born, her grandfather Tommy broke his leg while working down a mine and was held down on his kitchen table while a doctor operated without anaesthetic.

Aneira, whose dad Willie was also a miner, said: “The doctor needed paying but there was no money.

“This was the South Wales valleys in the 1930s. Everyone was poor. So they had to sell the family piano to raise money to pay the doctor.”

The mum of two, who lives in Loughor, Swansea, has six grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

Her husband Dennis died of a stroke in 2007. Over the years, her family has become entwined with the NHS.

Like Aneira, her three sisters went into nursing while two of her aunts were matrons. One, who worked in Whitchurch hospital in Cardiff, was nicknamed “The Dragon”.

She said: “My auntie Rowenna would go on her ward rounds and the nurses would ring down to the next ward to say, ‘The Dragon’s coming.’

“One day she picked up the phone herself and answered, ‘The Dragon’s already here!”

Aneira’s daughter Lindsey is a paramedic in Gorseinon, Swansea. She has also seen the other side of the NHS as a patient when she had a life-threatening brain haemorrhage three years ago.

Earlier this year, Aneira said she nearly lost Lindsey as staff shortages at her local hospital meant an ambulance took half an hour to arrive.

Aneira said: “It was scary at the time but she’s remarkable. She’s come on in leaps and bounds and is back at work.”

Ten years ago her son Kevin also had a brain haemorrhage.

She says: “When I met the surgeons who saved my children’s lives, I wanted to kiss their hands.”

There was a scare when her then ten-month-old grandson Joe was rushed to hospital after his blood sugar dropped and he turned purple.

She says he is now a “big, handsome 21-year-old”.

Another grandson, Evan, came into the world in a dramatic fashion when Beth, Aneira’s daughter-in law, experienced complications while in labour.

And Aneira’s own life has been saved by the NHS on a number of occasions.

She suffers from anaphylaxis — a life-threatening allergic reaction — mainly triggered by opiates in painkillers, and carries adrenalin shots everywhere she goes.

“I’ve been rushed to hospital eight to ten times,” she said. “I’ve had a couple in the last year. One happened in B&Q. It was like something from a Carry On film.

“I was lying on the floor fighting for my breath. I could feel it coming on and shouted to my partner to ring 999 and I dropped my leggings so he could give me the shot in my thigh.

“I told him he wasn’t doing it right — I was panicking, he was panicking — and he ended up injecting himself. When the paramedics got there, they didn’t know who to treat first.

“His heart was racing. I thought it was from the sight of my thighs!”

She knows the NHS can literally be a life-saver — which is why she is passionate that it must be protected.

Aneira said: “We all use it, we all need it. We have been left a legacy and it’s up to us to preserve it, protect it and sort it out.

“We are the envy of the world and so fortunate to have the NHS. Can you imagine having to check your pockets before calling an ambulance to see if you could afford it?”

She welcomes Prime Minister Theresa May’s promise of an extra £20billion a year by 2023 but wonders if the cash boost is “an election thing” to keep her in power.

Earlier this year, the Government signed off a pay deal which will mean NHS staff will receive an increase in pay over the next three years, with those on the lowest salaries benefiting from the biggest rises.

Aneira said: “They are all heroes. From the top surgeons, doctors, intensive care nurses, ward nurses, to the porters and kitchen staff.

“They work tirelessly for us and their wellbeing is important. There needs to be an injection of cash. We need more doctors and more nurses.

“Aneurin Bevan fought a lot of opposition to give us the NHS.

“We can’t let it slip away and we won’t. It belongs to the public.”

Even now, whenever she gets chance, Aneira will gladly spread the message about Bevan’s great legacy.

“I’ll look up to the statue of Nye Bevan in Cardiff and feel very emotional. The NHS means equality for all. There are always tourists looking at his statue and taking his picture.

“It’s a lovely spot to sit down there, opposite the castle. Sometimes strangers don’t know who he is so I make sure I tell them.

“I say to them, ‘Look at all these people, as far as your eye can see’. What he did has touched everyone’s lives.”

Aneira has been invited to all the big 70th anniversary celebrations, including a service at Llandaff Cathedral in Cardiff on Wednesday.

The event will be attended by Prince Charles and hosted by Carwyn Jones, the Welsh First Minister, and Dr Andrew Goodall, the Chief Executive of NHS Wales.

Aneira has landed another tasty task. She is also going to be a judge on BBC Two’s Great British Menu, in which champion chefs from previous series will compete for their chance to cook a banquet for NHS heroes.

“I’ve been getting about ten emails a day inviting me to events,” she said.

But with all the focus on the NHS’s birthday on Thursday, Aneira’s own celebrations will have to wait until the weekend.

“We’ve got a big family so we’re all getting together for Sunday lunch at our local golf club,” she said.

And no doubt her loved ones will raise a glass to her very good health.

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