Apparently there’s something wrong with the water system:
Polluted water is causing 60 per cent more hospital admissions than a decade ago, official figures show.
The number of people admitted to hospital for water-borne diseases – including dysentery and Weil’s disease – has increased from 2,085 people in 2010-11 to 3,286 in 2022-23, according to NHS statistics.
OK. Weil’s Disease has been rising in incidence for well over a decade, from 2018:
A deadly infection spread by rats has reached record levels in the number of hospital appointments taken up by people suffering from the illness.
Hospital sessions for people suffering from Weil's disease, which is spread by rats' urine, are three times the level three years ago and are now at unprecedented levels.
We’d like to know why of course. Perhaps more rats, perhaps different rats, perhaps councils aren’t controlling rats. And we are also told that dysentery cases are up - perhaps it’s just more people going to waters where Weil’s and dysentery can be caught?
We’d clearly like to know why this is happening - so we can decide what, if anything, we’re going to do about it.
From the Labour Party:
Labour pledged it would put failing water companies in special measures to force them to “clean up their toxic mess and protect people’s health”.
Ofwat, the regulator, would get powers to block the payment of any bonuses until water bosses had cleaned up the pollution, while water company bosses who oversaw repeated law-breaking would face criminal charges.
Clearly the blame is being placed upon the capitalist nature of the English water companies. For, as The Guardian of all places points out:
Waterborne diseases such as dysentery and Weil’s disease have risen by 60% since 2010 in England, new figures reveal.
OK.
We’d still like to find out what is causing this problem in England. And it’s true that England has capitalist water companies in a manner that the other Home Nations do not - Wales, Scotland and NI have variants of state owned water companies performing the job. The other home nations also have NHS organisations that are separate and thus their own statistics on this matter.
Which does mean that we can test the proposition. It’s possible that there is some, or some set of factors, increasing dysentery and Weil’s in these isles. Hand washing to more rats to greater water sports patrticipation to the capitalist nature of water provision. We’ve also the statistics to be able to at least begin to make the distinction. Compare the rise in infections across the Home Nations’ versions of the NHS to the ownership of the water companies across the Home Nations.
What has actually been done? Noting the rise in incidence in the one country, England, then blaming it upon the one difference in England, that ownership. Without, ever nor at all, actually testing the proposition. Which is, if we are to be very polite about it indeed, not a proof of anything at all other than the ability to project prejudice.
So, why do people urinate in the public information pool in this manner? Because it’s politically convenient to do so. Which is why politics is such a bad way of running anything - decisions are always based upon biased and piss poor information.