The NHS celebrated its 75th anniversary on Wednesday amid fresh warnings that it is facing pressure like never before, with the cost of rebuilding it laid bare by new figures.
Dr Chris Streather, medical director for NHS London, said staff are the capital’s “greatest asset” as events commemorating the founding of the health service were held across the country.
Aneurin “Nye” Bevan opened the first NHS hospital in Manchester on this day in 1948, promising a service that would “relieve money worries in times of illness”. To mark the occasion, the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh joined government leaders, celebrities and NHS staff for a multi-faith service at Westminster Abbey.
Landmarks, including the London Eye and the House of Commons, were also lighting up blue for the NHS’s birthday. Amanda Pritchard, chief executive of the NHS in England, said: “While many things have changed over the last 75 years, the skill and compassion of NHS staff who care for our patients and their families has always remained constant.
“They face enormous challenges: recovering services, addressing Covid backlogs that inevitably built up over the pandemic and dealing with record demand for services.”
She added: “This milestone 75th anniversary is an opportunity for us to reflect on their hard work and our achievements but to look to the future of the health service too.”
But the scale of the task of rebuilding the NHS was laid bare by figures showing that a record number of staff left the health service last year, while a record number of Britons also wait for treatment. Meanwhile, a wave of industrial action that swept the NHS at the beginning of this year shows no sign of fading, with junior doctors and consultants set to strike over pay later this month.
Waits for ambulances and treatment in A&E soared to record highs last winter as the NHS experienced an unprecedented level of demand.
It usually prioritises elective work in the summer months as demand drops, but the latest figures show the service is under severe pressure across a number of fronts while dealing with its worst-ever workforce crisis. Data analysed by the Standard showed:
- A total of 1,092,947 Londoners were awaiting hospital treatment at the end of April, the highest figure on record.
- London ambulance crews took an average of 42 minutes to respond to calls for heart attacks and strokes in May, the worst performance of any service in the country.
- One in eight nursing posts were vacant in London, the highest total of any region in England.
- The number of staff leaving the NHS in London has increased by 30 per cent in 10 years.
- More than a third (35.1 per cent) of London cancer patients waited more than two months for treatment after an urgent referral in March.
Nigel Edwards, chief executive of the Nuffield Trust, said he was “very concerned” for the future of the NHS and that staff shortages, a lack of capacity in hospitals and the broken social care system were creating a “doom spiral”.
He said: “I’ve seen several previous NHS crises but there are aspects of this that are different and are particularly worrisome. In previous years, the staff were still on board and behind the system. Many still are, but there is a real feeling of alienation. Increasingly, it looks more attractive to work in other parts of the economy or go abroad.”
Mr Edwards said the performance statistics showed the NHS was “running well over its designed capacity”, adding that the service was “unlikely to see a reduction in demand”. As performance statistics dip, satisfaction with the NHS has dropped to its lowest level on record. A poll in March by the National Centre for Social Research found that just 29 per cent of the public were satisfied with the health service, while more than half (51 per cent) were unhappy.
Senior health leaders in the capital are particularly concerned by delays in discharging patients from hospital. Many elderly patients are medically fit to be discharged but have no social care package to be discharged into. An average of 1,467 patients who were fit for discharge remained in London hospitals in the week up to May 31, creating a logjam in A&E as beds cannot be freed up for patients who need them. It means patients are often left waiting in the back of an ambulance outside hospital.
Dr John Martin, chief paramedic at the London Ambulance Service, told the Standard that the lack of capacity in A&E is leading to delays in responding to calls in the community. He said: “When I started in the Nineties, you would never stay with a patient in the back of an ambulance. It’s not good for patients waiting in the community; we need to get ambulances out of hospital and back out onto the next call.”
Meanwhile, the elective backlog continues to grow with the latest data showing that 1,092,947 Londoners were awaiting hospital treatment at the end of April. This included 65,689 children.
The crisis has been exacerbated by a struggle to retain NHS staff, with the total number of nursing vacancies in London rising by 17.7 per cent in the two years up to March 2023. There were also 99 fewer full-time GPs working in surgeries in May compared with the year before. A total of 26,313 London NHS staff left the health service in 2022, a rise of 13 per cent on the year before and a 30 per cent rise on the figure reported in 2012. This includes a 78 per cent rise in the number of consultants leaving the NHS compared with 10 years ago.
Last week, the Government pledged to recruit 300,000 extra nurses, doctors and other health workers over a 15-year period to plug staffing gaps. It is hoped that the recruitment drive, the biggest in NHS history, will be able to match the growing exodus of workers.
