The UK needs a Health and Care Workers Covenant

Abbasi mentions the vast number of problems that covid-19 has uncovered.1 To which we might add the very thing that ensures we have a functioning health service—as Hiam and colleagues say, the NHS is “run on the goodwill of its staff.”2

It has long been thus. This goodwill was described in 2015 as “a one-way street.”3 Despite its importance, only very occasionally has this reality been acknowledged publicly by politicians.

By way of comparison, we should look …