Private hospitals to take on extra 2.5 million patients for the NHS7 Jan 2025 05:18
As many as 2.5 million extra NHS patients a year could be treated in private clinics under a new deal to help clear the waiting list backlog.
Sir Keir Starmer said he was “not ideological” about allowing more private providers to carry out NHS operations and procedures to cope with demand because tackling the 7.5 million waiting list was “urgent”.
The new deal between NHS England and the private sector was unveiled as part of an elective care plan designed to meet the target of 92 per cent of patients being seen within 18 weeks, which Labour has pledged to reach by the next election.
The private sector currently carries out 1 million treatments for NHS patients a year, and says it has capacity to do a further 1 million.
On top of this, the Government wants more patients in deprived areas to have the choice of having their operation in a private clinic, which would be an extra 1.5 million a year, bringing the total up to 3.5 million.
The figure is not a target but Whitehall sources told The i Paper the Government wanted the private sector to deliver this number of treatments.
As private providers are mainly based in London and the south east, areas in northern England, including the most disadvantaged communities, currently experience the longest waits for elective treatment.
Figures from NHS England show people living in disadvantaged areas are 1.8 times more likely to wait over a year than someone living in more affluent neighbourhoods.
There is a postcode lottery for accessing care. For example, around 65.1 per cent of existing waits are within 18 weeks in the North East and Yorkshire region, whereas this figure is 55.1 per cent in the East of England.
NHS patients who undergo operations in private clinics do not have to pay but the NHS is charged for the cost of the procedure.
A standard hip operation costs the NHS around £7,000 whether it is carried out on the NHS or by a private provider treating an NHS patient.
The NHS and Independent Sector Partnership Agreement will help expand capacity and widen patient choice by setting out how more treatments can be delivered through the independent sector, with care remaining free at the point of use, the Department of Health said.
Speaking to NHS staff and reporters at a hospital in Surrey on Monday, the Prime Minister stressed that the private sector was already used across the NHS, with trusts paying companies for beds or treatments on a regular basis and said that he wanted to broaden this capacity to bring down waiting lists.
He said: “An element of private sector support in the NHS has been there for a very, very long time, and clearly we need to make best use of it.
“The agreement we’ve signed today is to make sure we can do it better so it is not just a sort of cherry picking of cases, it is a more comprehensive use.”
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