500 deaths per week are due to delays in public hospitals – RT in French

With Britain’s public healthcare system going through a deep crisis, resulting in record emergency waiting times, the president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine has called on the government to tackle the problem.

The president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, Dr Adrian Boyle, sounded the alarm bells on January 1 in the British media, saying that the public health system could not continue like this, calling the situation “dangerous and undignified “.

In difficulty for many years, the NHS has indeed been going through an even deeper crisis for months, which has worsened further since the start of winter. In particular, the lack of general practitioners which pushes the British to turn more and more to ambulance services and hospital emergencies. With the consequence of considerably increasing waiting times in the emergency room.

Originally, a shortage of general practitioners?

According to Adrian Boyle, this winter could well be the worst on record in terms of waiting times, which of course causes many problems, even many deaths.

“We believe that between 300 and 500 people die each week from delays and problems in emergency care. We have to tackle this problem. I would be surprised if December’s numbers on wait times [qui doivent encore être publiés] are not the worst we have known”, he explained, quoted by the Mirror.

“We need to increase our capacity, make sure there are other ways that people aren’t all being directed to ambulance services and emergency services,” he added at the address. of the government.

The public health system (NHS), underfunded for years, is in a serious crisis. The government has announced an increase in the NHS budget of 3.3 billion pounds in 2023 and 2024. According to the Royal College of Nurses, in England, 47,000 nursing positions are unfilled. Last year, 25,000 nurses or midwives who worked in the public slammed the door. And more than seven million people are waiting for treatment in English hospitals, a record high.