Going back to the name of the thread, it is not my responsibility to 'protect the NHS' - surely the dumbest slogan of the year especially as the NHS gave up treating many treatable health conditions in March. I have no emotional attachment to any public body as they are simply methods of providing a service (even if we have given them a monopoly with the inevitable problems that then arise). I also have no respect for an organisation which can remove everyone's liberty and basic human contact without any cost-benefit evidence.
Why not protect DVLA, protect Anglesey County Council, or protect British Potato Council. Why deify one body which has a history of awful delivery and has proven it cannot be trusted to manage public money.
Outside of Soviet/Marxist regimes most countries see no need to nationalise hospitals and medicine. And they existed in Britain too before our brief flirtation with Marx nationalised and destroyed so much. Abandon the NHS regime and health services will continue with new providers but without politicising the sector. The NHS has all the facets of a religion, which is dangerous as it prevents us moving on. The same thing happened with telexoms, electric, coal, steel, etc with fanatics preventing change in principle - tidy nobody cares less who delivers the service. Most people see that the dead hand of the public sector cannot deliver essential services, and their role should be limited to regulating better service providers.