Current pressure on the NHS is “unbearable and unsustainable”, with the crisis likley to continue until Easter, leading medics have said, amid warnings that delays in emergency care could be causing the deaths of up to 500 people each week.
A Welsh health board declared a critical incident on Monday as it tackled an “unprecedented” surge in patients, as other hospital trusts appealed to the public not to attend A&E departments unless their condition is life-threatening.
Prof Phil Banfield, chair of the British Medical Association council, hit out at Rishi Sunak and health secretary Steve Barclay as he offered a stark warning about the scale of the problem.
Calling on the government to “step up and take immediate action” to solve the crisis, he said the silence from No 10 on the offer of talks with the BMA on staff shortages and other issues was “deafening”.
He added: “It is disingenuous for the prime minister to talk about ‘backing the NHS’ in his new year message, when his own health secretary is failing to discuss how this crisis can be fixed.”
Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, said: “It seems likely that the next three months will be defined by further critical incidents needing to be declared and the quality of care being compromised. Some of our members have said their ward staffing numbers are now below minimum levels as they work hard to set up more escalation spaces to support arrivals from ambulances, that they have had instances where their oxygen cylinders have run out temporarily, and that some of their patients have waited over two days for a bed.”
Tim Cooksley, president of the Society for Acute Medicine, told BBC Radio 4’s The World at One that the current situation in A&E departments is “unbearable”, as he called on the government to urgently provide a plan for the NHS workforce.
The Royal College of Emergency Medicine also doubled down on its claim that between 300 and 500 people are dying each week as a result of problems in emergency care, as it warned against any attempt to “discredit” the figure.
Ian Higginson, vice-president of the college, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “If you’re at the front line, you know that this is a longstanding problem. This isn’t a short-term thing.
“These are real figures, and I worry that we’re going to hear attempts to spin and manipulate this data and discredit it. I think if we hear that, we’ve got to say ‘No, that is spin,’” he added.
It comes after The Independent revealed internal NHS data showing that the crisis in A&E departments had been linked with more than 15,000 deaths in the past 18 months – as many as 500 patients a week.
Some health chiefs urged caution on Monday, with NHS England’s chief strategy officer Chris Hopson warning that a full review of the figures was needed.
“We need to be very careful about jumping to conclusions about excess mortality numbers and their cause without a full and detailed look at the evidence, which is now under way,” he told The World at One.
But the Royal College of Emergency Medicine said A&E departments are in “complete crisis”, and warned that patients will die as a result of the current state of the health service.
“The government should deliver on its obligations to the public,” said Prof Banfield. “It is just not true that the cost of resolving this mess cannot be afforded by this country. This is a political choice, and patients are dying unnecessarily because of that choice.”
A severe flu outbreak and rising Covid cases are said to be adding pressure to the system and overwhelming hospitals with patients.
Some critically ill patients are reported to have waited hours for a bed, and ambulances have been unable to pick up those in need because they have been stuck waiting to hand over patients to hospitals.
Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board, which covers counties in North Wales, declared a critical incident, pointing to a shortage of beds and long waiting times to access care at A&E.
Swansea Bay NHS Trust put out a warning to people not to attend Morrison Hospital’s A&E department unless their condition is life-threatening, because of the long waiting times. Hospitals across the border in Gloucestershire put out a similar appeal, saying staff are under “unprecedented pressure”.
In November last year, 37,837 patients waited more than 12 hours in A&E for a decision to be admitted to a hospital department, according to NHS England figures – an increase of almost 355 per cent compared with the previous November.
“The system is hardly coping right now,” NHS Confederation chief Matthew Taylor told Sky News on Monday – adding that four days of strike action this month would put unbearable pressure on the health service.
“This is an extraordinary time. I speak to NHS leaders just about every day, and a lot of them, if not most of them, say ‘This is the toughest winter we’ve dealt with.’ We cannot go on like this,” he said.
Ambulance staff are set to strike again on 11 and 23 January, while nurses will walk out on 18 and 19 January. Junior doctors are to be balloted over industrial action from 9 January, the BMA has said.
Labour’s shadow health secretary Wes Streeting urged ministers to sit down with striking nurses and other healthcare workers, warning that the NHS cannot bear another walkout.
He told BBC Radio 4’s PM programme: “They’ve got to sit down immediately with the unions to avert strike action because we cannot afford another day of strike action and with 130,000 vacancies we can’t afford to keep on haemorrhaging more staff from the NHS.”
Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats called on the government to recall parliament over the current crisis, saying it was a “life or death situation” for many people across the country.
The party’s health spokesperson Daisy Cooper said: “The NHS is collapsing in front of our eyes whilst the prime minister and health secretary are nowhere to be seen. Nobody should lose a loved one because the government was asleep on the job.”
A Savanta poll for the Lib Dems found a worrying trend in “DIY” treatment. One in six (16 per cent) of those who could not get an appointment said they had either administered treatment themselves or asked somebody else who was not medically qualified to do so.
No 10 has said Mr Sunak will launch an urgent care recovery plan in a bid to get on top of long waiting times for ambulances, but there is no timetable as yet.
Education minister Robert Halfon told the Today programme on Monday that the pressure on A&E departments is a “top priority” for the PM. “The government is putting a lot of funding and doing everything possible,” he said.
The government said it was putting an additional £14.1bn into health and social care in the next two years, and an extra £500m into speeding up hospital discharges.
