Attlee's 1945 Labour government was re-elected in 1950, but with a smaller majority. In the financial crisis of 1951, when cuts were needed, the National Health Service, as was to become usual for all governments, was the target. Naturally, Aneurin Bevan, by then the Minister of Labour, fought to protect what he always considered his Health Service from a £10 million cut. At the Cabinet meeting on 22 March, Bevan reluctantly accepted a one-shilling charge for the until-then free prescriptions, but
refused to allow a payment for spectacles and false teeth. The Chancellor, Hugh Gaitskell, demanded all the cuts.

Meanwhile, Attlee had a recurrence of a chronic duodenal ulcer, for which he had been in hospital in 1948, and on 21 March 1951 he was admitted to a single room of the Lindo private wing of St Mary's for five weeks of what should have been complete bed rest. On 9 April, Herbert Morrison, the Foreign Secretary, chaired the Cabinet and instead of achieving a compromise, allowed a vote that approved all Gaitskell's NHS cuts. That day, Attlee was visited by Morrison, who wanted him to insist on Bevan
accepting the Cabinet's decision. Next came Bevan and the President of the Board of Trade Harold Wilson to press their point of view. Attlee urged them not to resign on this issue, because he knew it would split the party and lose Labour the next election. Finally that evening, Gaitskell came in, refused to compromise and threatened to resign if Attlee backed Bevan. 

The next day, the Budget was presented in the Commons and Gaitskell announced his cuts. Bevan and Wilson were joined by the Parliamentary Secretary John Freeman and again threatened to resign while Morrison, Gaitskell and others insisted that the PM force Bevan to resign unless he accepted not only the NHS cuts but also a rearmament programme for the Korean War. On 23 April, Bevan and Wilson resigned, to be joined by Freeman the next day. Attlee left hospital on 27 April, Labour split, lost the election on 25 October and the Conservatives held office for the next 13 years, the second-longest single party reign in 20th-century Britain.

Attlee always maintained that if he had not been in hospital and had chaired the Cabinet instead of Morrison, he could have effected a compromise, especially because the defence budget estimate was never fully spent, making the NHS cuts unnecessary. Wilson's judgment was similar but others are convinced that the Gaitskell vs. Bevan conflict was incurable. However, I do not consider that Attlee's ministers or his historians appreciated that in 1951, the object of admitting a patient with a peptic ulcer to hospital was complete bed rest. Attlee, normally master of his government's prima donnas, confined to a tiny room, probably without en suite facilities, given a tasteless ulcer diet, prevented from smoking and conventionally sedated with barbiturates, was no match for the endless importuning visitors. Nevertheless, at least my predecessors at St Mary's cured Attlee's ulcer. 

Anthony Eden had a charmed early life as the younger son of a country baronet. He was tall, handsome and immaculately dressed and had high self-esteem. He went to Eton, had a gallant war with a Military Cross, took a First at Christ Church in Arabic and Persian, won a safe Conservative seat and saw rapid promotion in the Foreign Office. Yet it has been said that Eden "was ill-served by his doctors".