Nearly all of the new NHS funding announced by the prime minister will be consumed at the expense of inflation and growing demand, leaving only £800m left to improve services.
in him autumn declarationJeremy Hunt has promised an extra £3.3 billion in funding for the NHS each year for the next two years.
Analysis by the Nuffield Trust, shared exclusively with Sky News, shows that rising prices and growing demand will use up three-quarters of next year’s gains and all of the gains expected for 2024. /25.
Half of the total increase in funding is likely to be eroded by inflation, as the UK endures a second year of rising prices. An analysis by Sky News found that rising energy prices added £121m to the running costs of NHS buildings in the year to March.
Inflation is expected to cost the health service £3.2 billion over the next two years, while increased demand from a growing and aging population is expected to cost the NHS an extra 852 million pounds next year and 1.7 billion pounds next year.
That leaves just £795 million to improve service next year, a quarter of a top funding increase of £3.3 billion.
Meanwhile, the projected increase for 2024/25 is set purely in response to inflationary pressures and growing demand.
John Appleby, chief economist at Nuffield Trust, says that the final amount “could be higher or lower”, depending on whether the trusts have overspending and whether some key expenses, such as like nurses’ salaries, are they growing faster than expected?
Nurse is prepare to strike next month on the government’s decision not to raise wages in line with inflation.
Rising energy costs have strained NHS England’s finances. Analysis of Sky News data from NHS Digital shows an 18 per cent increase in fuel prices added £121m to the operating costs of health service buildings in the year to March.
Many NHSs believe costs will rise further. A recent report by the British Medical Journal found some trusts are budgeting for fuel costs by an extra £2m a month next year.
Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust has confirmed to Sky News it expects annual energy bills to more than triple by 2023, adding £24m to operational costs.
It’s not just energy prices that are rising. For example, the increased cost of hiring cleaners has added £76m to the cost of the health service over the past year, while higher inpatient meals have added up. 38 million pounds.
Matthew Taylor, chief executive of NHS Providers, told Sky News that the new money promised by the prime minister would allow the NHS to “virtually keep the scheme running”.
“It will allow us to continue to manage a very difficult situation and hopefully make further progress in areas such as waiting lists.
“What it won’t do is solve the fundamental problems and get the NHS where the public wants it to be.”
More than 7 million people in the UK are currently waiting for treatment. That’s almost one-eighth of the population, and the number has been growing for 28 consecutive months.
The number of people waiting more than four hours at A&E is also at record levelwhile the response time of the ambulance is far beyond the target.
David Maguire, senior analyst at King’s Fund, told Sky News that local NHS trusts are likely to face “really, really hard decisions” about where to focus their resources. them in the years to come.
“You always have to prioritize emergency and urgent care. That can mean less focus on goals like improving productivity or investing in preventive care. We’ve seen a decline. reduced at the NHS England level for some funding for transformation efforts, for example around digital technology and data usage.”
This is not the first time the NHS has slashed long-term investments to free up resources for frontline services.
Between 2014 and 2019, the £4.3 billion spent on capital investment was instead used to fund day-to-day spending.
That decision left the NHS with a £10.2 billion worth of maintenance work backlog – equivalent to 92 per cent of the full annual cost of running NHS facilities.
Almost a fifth of that backlog (£1.8bn) is classified as ‘high risk’, meaning it could lead to ‘catastrophic failure, serious disruption to clinical services or safety omission resulting in serious injury or prosecution”.
Mr Taylor said: “We have a number of hospitals that are currently being held up by struts.
“It’s not something you want people to do – lie on a hospital bed looking at a temporary strut holding up the roof. These hospitals are not dangerous right now, but over time they will become dangerous and this needs to be done. be solved.”
Handling the maintenance backlog is increasingly hindering the trusts’ ability to invest in improving service. Last year, the NHS spent £1.4 billion dealing with a maintenance backlog, representing 16% of their entire capital budget.
And that capital budget is already low by international standards. OECD data shows that in the decade before the pandemic, the UK’s long-term investment in the healthcare sector accounted for just 0.25% of GDP – compared with 0.38% in France and 0.69% in U.S.A.
Reduce waiting list
To reduce the number of patients waiting for treatment, NHS England set a target in February of returning NHS operations to pre-pandemic levels by early 2022-2023 and increasing operations by 29% within two years.
Thousands of additional staff have been hired in recent years, but the impact of COVID-19 and targeted demand mean the NHS remains understaffed.
Trusts are increasingly hiring expensive agency staff to fill the void, putting more pressure on budgets.
Spending on agency staff hit £3 billion in the year to March, up from £2.4 billion two years earlier.
Hours before the prime minister’s statement on Thursday, the National Audit Office said the NHS was unlikely to meet its operational targets, pointing to the impact of inflation, staff shortages and other problems. productivity issue.
Although the number of clinical staff has increased by 13% since 2018, the number of people removed from the NHS waiting list each month has increased by only 2%.
NHS chief executive Amanda Pritchard said the prime minister’s decision to increase funding for the health service showed “the government has taken its pledge to prioritize the NHS seriously”.
She said: “While I am under no illusions that NHS staff will face very challenging times ahead, especially during the winter, this agreement will provide sufficient funding for the NHS to carry out its main priority”.
