A quick thank you

Being most of the way through the 2024 annual subscriptions renewals for ‘Cowper’s Cut’, it is again clear to me that subscribers continue to want to support this thing to exist.

Thank you for that. I’m grateful.

What is ’this thing’ now, in summer 2024? I’m painfully aware that it’s become much more of a weekly long read, which is some way from its original incarnation as a weekly column when it stared in Health Service Journal back in 2017.

I think that’s probably OK: change often is.

This sector remains complex, and its politics remain under-discussed. And it’s been a truly remarkable ride, these past few years.

You’ll notice that I reneged on my proposal to increase annual subscription prices this year, and instead kept the 2024 re-subscription fee at £100.

I’m confident that you’ll understand that holding the launch price as it is can’t last forever.

I will increase the subscription cost for the 2025 renewals round (as I’ll probably change the payment provider next year, following a big and unjustified fee hike from the existing one), but it struck me that one last bit of reciprocal loyalty on my part wouldn’t be unreasonable to those of you who chose to come along on this ride.

Anyway, this means that ‘Cut’ is now 20% cheaper in real terms than it was at launch. Not many things about which you can say that. Productivity gains, innit.

A short one from me, for once: will wonders never cease?