Support our Nation today - please donate here
News

Wales needs to have ‘national conversation’ about future of the NHS after ‘two decades of getting worse’ say Tories

23 Dec 2021 4 minute read
Russell George MS

Wales needs to have a “national conversation” about the future of the NHS after two decades of “getting perpetually worse” the Welsh Conservatives’ health spokesperson has said.

His comments came as the numbers on waiting lists for non-urgent hospital treatment in Wales hit record levels for the 18th successive month.

One in five people in Wales – 679,626 individuals – were on a NHS waiting lists in October, nearly 11,000 more than the previous month and up by 50% since the start of the Covid pandemic.

Conservative Senedd Member Russell George said that the Covid pandemic was a factor but that the Welsh NHS had been slowly deteriorating for a long time before then.

“It is clear that Labour has lost its grip on the NHS,” he said. “But we all must also have a serious national conversation on how we learn to live with this virus and the increasing demands we, as a nation, put on our national health service.

“Although coronavirus and the pent-up demand from previous lockdowns is obviously a huge factor in today’s damning statistics, there has to come a point when things get better.

“However, Labour’s record over two decades is one where things have gotten perpetually worse: doubling the waiting list in the year before Covid struck, experiencing its worst-ever A&E waits the year before the pandemic, and removing conditions like strokes from the red-call ambulance criteria.”

‘Encouraging’

The Welsh Government said that the continued pandemic meant that waiting times would continue to rise.

“Our immediate focus is now on ensuring we deal with this next difficult phase of the pandemic and that patients can receive urgent care when they need it,” they said.

“It is encouraging to see improvement in the ambulance performance for November. But they and emergency departments remain under pressure.”

The NHS Confederation in Wales, which represents health boards, said the whole of the health and care system was “working tirelessly to find both short and long-term solutions” to the challenges faced.

“The performance in some areas, for example in urgent and emergency care, is improving month-on-month but there are still enormous challenges ahead,” said director Darren Hughes.

The number of people waiting over two years increased by 8,253 in a single month, a 28.6% jump to 35,483. Around 2,000 extra people are now also waiting over a year compared to September.

Additional figures showed a third (33.34%) of patients had to wait over the four hour target to be seen in A&E last month, the third-worst month for the Welsh NHS on record.

Betsi Cadwaladr Health Board, which covers North Wales, was the worst performing in the nation against the four-hour A&E target, seeing only 62% in four hours. Wrexham Maelor Hospital saw fewer than half its patients (42.2%) in four hours, making it the worst performing in Wales.

When it came to ambulance performance in November, only 53% of responses to immediately life-threatening calls arrived within eight minutes. The target of 65% of red-calls reaching their patient within eight minutes has not been reached in 16 months.

The slowest ambulances were in the Powys health board area with only 41.8% arriving within the eight-minute target, but three other health boards posted a figure under 50%.

Three-in-four (74.2%) amber call patients – which include strokes – took over 30 minutes to be reached. This was most acute in Swansea Bay with only 16.8% of calls arriving within half an hour.

Welsh Conservative and Shadow Health Minister Russell George MS said: “Moving forward, we need to relieve pressures on A&E in three steps: encouraging use of other services like minor injury units and community pharmacists, rolling out regional surgical hubs to deal with the treatment backlog, and making it far easier to access GP services.”

 


Support our Nation today

For the price of a cup of coffee a month you can help us create an independent, not-for-profit, national news service for the people of Wales, by the people of Wales.

Subscribe
Notify of
guest
11 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Gareth
Gareth
2 years ago

Just like the NHS of England, Scotland and N Ireland, ours has struggled, after over a decade of Tory cuts and austerity, and willful neglect from Westminster. All figures for the last decade show less and less spending by Westminster year on year in real terms, at least our Gov has resisted the creeping privatisation that is taking place in England. An independent Wales, would allow us, just like Westminster can right now, to borrow money to invest, not only in the current system, but also in preventative measures. These are the talks we should be having, how can we… Read more »

Last edited 2 years ago by Gareth
Notta Bott
Notta Bott
2 years ago

Its worse because of your parties under funding you moron

GW Atkinson
GW Atkinson
2 years ago

Nothing to do with the virus the English government allowed on our doorstep through their lack of action on the borders eh?

Quornby
Quornby
2 years ago

Yes we need a conversation with Tories excluded.

Richard
Richard
2 years ago

Russell is quite right and the conversation needs to be positive , inclusive and honest over why we need one ☝️.

I can well remember much of the causes well – and he needs to honest on who it was who kicked elected and accountable folk off the local health boards prior to populating them with the wealthy landed minor Tory Squires & party faithful – as happened in many areas of Wales..

At least we were appointed rather than anointed!

hdavies15
hdavies15
2 years ago

Ah, a call for a national conversation when it may suit them. We need much more than a conversation about NHS, we need a serious conversation about the entire future of Wales and the Welsh. Unfortunately that is a dialogue that is beyond their wit.

Ed Jones
Ed Jones
2 years ago

He’s going to really flip his lid when he hears about this place called England and just how well they too are coping…
Just as an aside, do these Tories ever say anything positive about Wales? Am being (perhaps a first, granted) serious here…

Last edited 2 years ago by Ed Jones
Mark
Mark
2 years ago

OMG! these tories, don’t they just make you want to give them a slap!

Adopted Cardi
Adopted Cardi
2 years ago

tories definitely on the back foot – panicking a bit I’d say.

Grayham Jones
2 years ago

Kick all English party’s out of wales 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 it’s time for a new wales 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

Malcolm rj
Malcolm rj
2 years ago

The biggest problem with the NHS is just to Manny chef’s and not enough indians and they’re spend a lot of time protecting and building they’re little empire

Our Supporters

All information provided to Nation.Cymru will be handled sensitively and within the boundaries of the Data Protection Act 2018.