Star comment: Praise to those who help the NHS

There is the diagnosis, and we know the symptoms, but you have to wonder whether collectively we have accepted that the disease is better than the cure, which would involve an injection of cash on a scale to make taxpayers blanch, or alternatively an abandonment of a "free" NHS and a switch to an NHS which is paid for directly.

These are remedies which are politically impossible. A political party which advocated tax rises on the scale required would be unelectable, as would a political party which advocated scrapping the NHS in its present form and a switch to a private system.

With demand increasing all the time, and new treatments coming on stream which are so expensive that difficult decisions are having to be taken about who goes with, and who goes without, the NHS is incapable of curing itself.

Amid this gloom, there is a beacon of light, and that is the work of charities and fundraisers who are doing their bit in paying for, and providing, new equipment. Salopians and Mid Wales folk have a distinguished record in this regard and one of the most successful and enduring successes was the wonderful Cobalt Unit Appeal which was launched by Bernard Lingen in his year of office as Shrewsbury Mayor back in 1979. The target was to raise £1.25 million to build a cancer treatment centre at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital. The response was wonderful, and Councillor Lingen cut the first turf of the new Shropshire and Mid Wales Cobalt Unit in January 1981.

Councillor Lingen's spirit lives on, both in name and in action. An appeal by the Lingen Davies Cancer Fund to help pay for a new machine to treat cancer patients at the RSH has reached its £750k target nearly four months early.

Another example of a stirring Shropshire effort has come with a golf tournament which has raised £10,000 to help prostate cancer patients. The tournament, organised by Santander Corporate & Commercial, was in memory of former cancer patient David Roberts.

These are just two examples of what is being done. The people who are doing these good works are not looking for any sort of reward let alone some sort of personal glory, but the fact that they are just getting on with it quietly is all the more reason to say a heartfelt thank you.