The England football team is better managed than the country’s health policy

The National Health Service in England is at breaking point. A new briefing by the House of Commons library paints a bleak picture.1 Since 2011, the number of people waiting for treatment has doubled to more than seven million and almost half of patients are waiting more than four hours at emergency departments, an almost 10-fold increase. The target of treating 85% of cancer patients within 62 days of GP referral has not been achieved since 2014 and now stands at 60.5%. Health professionals are exhausted and demoralised. The Royal College of Nursing voted to strike for the first time in its history, now to be joined by unions representing paramedics.2 The extra £3.3bn given to the NHS in the autumn statement will do almost nothing to deal with these problems after a decade of underinvestment and with a massive backlog to clear.3Meanwhile, Britain is getting sicker. Uniquely among industrialised…
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