One in six people are turning to private healthcare, a report has found, as access to the NHS worsens amid strikes.
A YouGov poll found that 17 per cent had paid for some form of non-dental private healthcare, with the wish to avoid waiting lists given as the most common reason.
Previous polls have put the figure at around one in eight.
It comes as the NHS braces for the start of the biggest strike in its history, with junior doctors set to walk out for five days from Thursday.
Consultants, many earning more than £100,000, will stage their own two-day walkout on July 20, giving hospitals just 48 hours to get back on their feet.
Two days of strikes are then scheduled by radiographers between July 25 and 8am on July 27.
NHS waiting lists in England are now thought to total at least 7.4 million.
Commissioned by the Institute of Public Policy Research, the new poll indicates that one in three British adults have faced difficulty gaining access to NHS healthcare since 2020 – roughly equivalent to 17 million people.
The think tank warned that the proportion rose to 51 per cent when it came to people with a life-limiting health condition, and that this is having a direct effect on patient’s ability to earn a living.
Chris Thomas, who led the research, said: “On the NHS’s birthday, we urgently need to transition it from an illness to a wellness service – focused on prevention, proactivity, and personalised long-term condition management.
“This is the only way to deliver on the public’s priority of a universal, comprehensive and free NHS, that flourishes in the 21st century.”
According to the survey, nearly nine in 10 of respondents said the NHS should remain free at the point of delivery, with more than eight in 10 believing it should be funded through taxation.
Hospital bosses have warned that the upcoming industrial action poses a “huge and ongoing risk” to patients.
NHS Providers, which represents trust chief executives, said that the upcoming industrial action would create a “domino effect” and would worsen waiting lists.
“The disruption for many thousands of patients and the potential harm of delaying their treatment is a huge and growing risk for the NHS to manage. Trusts will hardly have time to draw breath,” said Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of NHS Providers.
“The domino effect of repeated waves of industrial action is eroding the fundamental relationship between trust leaders and their staff.”
Junior doctors are demanding a 35 per cent pay increase.
Consultants have not publicly disclosed their precise demand, but they have argued that their pay has decreased in real terms by the same figure since 2008.
On Tuesday Steve Barclay, the health secretary, said ministers were “willing to work constructively with trade union colleagues” but added that “a 35 per cent demand from the junior doctors is not one that is affordable”.
He made the comments as part of a parliamentary exchange with Wes Streeting, Labour’s health spokesman, who said Mr Barclay “can’t even successfully negotiate with his own Chancellor” over what to pay NHS staff.
A little unnerving seeing all the comments from Telegraph readers who are actually advocating private healthcare over the NHS.
Just as the Tories planned! They’ve always hated the NHS and would love it privatised!
We’re going to wind up with 2-tier healthcare where people who have jobs or the money get good and prompt treatment, while those who don’t are forced to wait years for basic interventions and routine treatments.
so that is just what the traitory party want, dismantle the NHS so that we can all pay private companies more money for a worse service. Lowering life expectancy for the poorest in society.
I hope you are proud traitorygraph of promoting a group of scumbags who want to make the lives of the people of the UK worse.
> One in six turn to private healthcare as ~~strikes~~ underfunding, mismanagement, misallocation of resources and mistreatment wreak havoc on NHS
FTFY, Telegraph.
Let me just correct that headline: “…as the Tories wreak havoc on the NHS.”
Its quite obvious now there is a “US and THEM” social divide now. Its the way tory’s want it. Poor and Wealthy and no middle class, its how it was in the 80’s. US being the ones who will have to wait years for treatment or die of illnesses such as cancer because we are poorer/low income households and our lives mean nothing. We (the working class) are truly treated like shit on the bottom of our shoes.
Then you have THEM who can get instant private healthcare and treatment because their lives are cherisable and meaningful because they have money 🤮 money doesnt make you happy, but it makes life ALOT easier…
Whatever happened to every life is treasurable.
Nice if you can afford it.
If you can’t, go get stuffed I guess.
Remember that private health care takes capacity from the NHS. A nurse might do 4 days NHS then 1 day private to earn £££. Without private the nurse would have to do 100% NHS work but the private work pays so well.
Typical Torygraph, it’s not strikes wreaking havoc.
Wait, you mean it’s strikes wreaking havoc on the NHS? And all this time I thought it was the more than a decade of deliberate underfunding at the hands of a Tory party ideologically opposed to the very existence of nationalised health care 😯
This was the plan all along. Our country is sleepwalking into privatised healthcare and no one cares enough to stop it
Strikes???
More like the Conservative government of the last 13 years first imposing Austerity when many other countries i.e Obama’s America did not as they could see the damage it would cause. Furthermore engineering a 2 tier health system between private and NHS so if anyone needs an operation without waiting 5 years, their only option will be to go private.
What a clever piece from the old Torygraph
One in 6 is able to do that mostly not because of the strikes but the performance of the NHS. NHS is not some pub which, if the bartender upsets you will go down the road.
I have it through work, have not needed it yet, but glad it’s there if I do.
My dad was suffering with severe chestpains a few weeks ago, doctors got him a “emergency appointment” at the hospital in 6 weeks time which we all thought was ridiculous. My auntie generously offered to pay for him to go private. Within a week he had a consultation with a specialist, angiogram, echo and blood tests. We now know he has 3 blocked arteries and is already on the waiting list for the operation he needs. The hospital appoint was also just a consultation with a nurse so God knows how long things would of took to get all the tests he needed. If something feels urgent private is 100% worth it not having to deal with the absolute farce of the NHS. Obviously not everyone is lucky enough to have family like that. The NHS desperately needs sorting out ASAP.
Nice of the telegraph to blame all of the nhs problems on the strikes
Which proves that the other 83% of the population probably can’t afford private health care, and demonstrates why we need to keep the NHS.
Uh no, I signed up to private health care due to the wait times/unless you’re dying you don’t get it. Aka NHS doesn’t have enough budget. I support NHS strikes
What about the other 5 out of 6 people who pay into the system, who are constantly failed by it? The NHS is a brilliant idea, but it’s obvious the Tories are letting it go to shit on purpose, thereby undermining public opinion in it, thus increasing the amount of people forced to go private, ultimately making them and their cronies more money.
Well if it wasn’t the strikes it was going to be the waiting times which haven’t been helped by recent years.
I just got a new job. One of the benefits is private healthcare and optional private dental care. To be completely honest that’s one of the things I’m most excited about. I’m young and healthy but knowing that if an issue does arise I can be seen and treated straight away puts me at ease. Of course, that’s how the NHS should be too
The NHS themselves send you to a private health care place… that gives you shite service cos you’re a NHS referral. I’ve been dealing with a MCL tear for close to a year now, just constant “do physio” rather than “hey let’s repair that MCL”. Our health care is fucked
24 comments
(Article)
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One in six people are turning to private healthcare, a report has found, as access to the NHS worsens amid strikes.
A YouGov poll found that 17 per cent had paid for some form of non-dental private healthcare, with the wish to avoid waiting lists given as the most common reason.
Previous polls have put the figure at around one in eight.
It comes as the NHS braces for the start of the biggest strike in its history, with junior doctors set to walk out for five days from Thursday.
Consultants, many earning more than £100,000, will stage their own two-day walkout on July 20, giving hospitals just 48 hours to get back on their feet.
Two days of strikes are then scheduled by radiographers between July 25 and 8am on July 27.
NHS waiting lists in England are now thought to total at least 7.4 million.
Commissioned by the Institute of Public Policy Research, the new poll indicates that one in three British adults have faced difficulty gaining access to NHS healthcare since 2020 – roughly equivalent to 17 million people.
The think tank warned that the proportion rose to 51 per cent when it came to people with a life-limiting health condition, and that this is having a direct effect on patient’s ability to earn a living.
Chris Thomas, who led the research, said: “On the NHS’s birthday, we urgently need to transition it from an illness to a wellness service – focused on prevention, proactivity, and personalised long-term condition management.
“This is the only way to deliver on the public’s priority of a universal, comprehensive and free NHS, that flourishes in the 21st century.”
According to the survey, nearly nine in 10 of respondents said the NHS should remain free at the point of delivery, with more than eight in 10 believing it should be funded through taxation.
Hospital bosses have warned that the upcoming industrial action poses a “huge and ongoing risk” to patients.
NHS Providers, which represents trust chief executives, said that the upcoming industrial action would create a “domino effect” and would worsen waiting lists.
“The disruption for many thousands of patients and the potential harm of delaying their treatment is a huge and growing risk for the NHS to manage. Trusts will hardly have time to draw breath,” said Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of NHS Providers.
“The domino effect of repeated waves of industrial action is eroding the fundamental relationship between trust leaders and their staff.”
Junior doctors are demanding a 35 per cent pay increase.
Consultants have not publicly disclosed their precise demand, but they have argued that their pay has decreased in real terms by the same figure since 2008.
On Tuesday Steve Barclay, the health secretary, said ministers were “willing to work constructively with trade union colleagues” but added that “a 35 per cent demand from the junior doctors is not one that is affordable”.
He made the comments as part of a parliamentary exchange with Wes Streeting, Labour’s health spokesman, who said Mr Barclay “can’t even successfully negotiate with his own Chancellor” over what to pay NHS staff.
A little unnerving seeing all the comments from Telegraph readers who are actually advocating private healthcare over the NHS.
Just as the Tories planned! They’ve always hated the NHS and would love it privatised!
We’re going to wind up with 2-tier healthcare where people who have jobs or the money get good and prompt treatment, while those who don’t are forced to wait years for basic interventions and routine treatments.
so that is just what the traitory party want, dismantle the NHS so that we can all pay private companies more money for a worse service. Lowering life expectancy for the poorest in society.
I hope you are proud traitorygraph of promoting a group of scumbags who want to make the lives of the people of the UK worse.
> One in six turn to private healthcare as ~~strikes~~ underfunding, mismanagement, misallocation of resources and mistreatment wreak havoc on NHS
FTFY, Telegraph.
Let me just correct that headline: “…as the Tories wreak havoc on the NHS.”
Its quite obvious now there is a “US and THEM” social divide now. Its the way tory’s want it. Poor and Wealthy and no middle class, its how it was in the 80’s. US being the ones who will have to wait years for treatment or die of illnesses such as cancer because we are poorer/low income households and our lives mean nothing. We (the working class) are truly treated like shit on the bottom of our shoes.
Then you have THEM who can get instant private healthcare and treatment because their lives are cherisable and meaningful because they have money 🤮 money doesnt make you happy, but it makes life ALOT easier…
Whatever happened to every life is treasurable.
Nice if you can afford it.
If you can’t, go get stuffed I guess.
Remember that private health care takes capacity from the NHS. A nurse might do 4 days NHS then 1 day private to earn £££. Without private the nurse would have to do 100% NHS work but the private work pays so well.
Typical Torygraph, it’s not strikes wreaking havoc.
Wait, you mean it’s strikes wreaking havoc on the NHS? And all this time I thought it was the more than a decade of deliberate underfunding at the hands of a Tory party ideologically opposed to the very existence of nationalised health care 😯
This was the plan all along. Our country is sleepwalking into privatised healthcare and no one cares enough to stop it
Strikes???
More like the Conservative government of the last 13 years first imposing Austerity when many other countries i.e Obama’s America did not as they could see the damage it would cause. Furthermore engineering a 2 tier health system between private and NHS so if anyone needs an operation without waiting 5 years, their only option will be to go private.
What a clever piece from the old Torygraph
One in 6 is able to do that mostly not because of the strikes but the performance of the NHS. NHS is not some pub which, if the bartender upsets you will go down the road.
I have it through work, have not needed it yet, but glad it’s there if I do.
My dad was suffering with severe chestpains a few weeks ago, doctors got him a “emergency appointment” at the hospital in 6 weeks time which we all thought was ridiculous. My auntie generously offered to pay for him to go private. Within a week he had a consultation with a specialist, angiogram, echo and blood tests. We now know he has 3 blocked arteries and is already on the waiting list for the operation he needs. The hospital appoint was also just a consultation with a nurse so God knows how long things would of took to get all the tests he needed. If something feels urgent private is 100% worth it not having to deal with the absolute farce of the NHS. Obviously not everyone is lucky enough to have family like that. The NHS desperately needs sorting out ASAP.
Nice of the telegraph to blame all of the nhs problems on the strikes
Which proves that the other 83% of the population probably can’t afford private health care, and demonstrates why we need to keep the NHS.
Uh no, I signed up to private health care due to the wait times/unless you’re dying you don’t get it. Aka NHS doesn’t have enough budget. I support NHS strikes
What about the other 5 out of 6 people who pay into the system, who are constantly failed by it? The NHS is a brilliant idea, but it’s obvious the Tories are letting it go to shit on purpose, thereby undermining public opinion in it, thus increasing the amount of people forced to go private, ultimately making them and their cronies more money.
Well if it wasn’t the strikes it was going to be the waiting times which haven’t been helped by recent years.
I just got a new job. One of the benefits is private healthcare and optional private dental care. To be completely honest that’s one of the things I’m most excited about. I’m young and healthy but knowing that if an issue does arise I can be seen and treated straight away puts me at ease. Of course, that’s how the NHS should be too
The NHS themselves send you to a private health care place… that gives you shite service cos you’re a NHS referral. I’ve been dealing with a MCL tear for close to a year now, just constant “do physio” rather than “hey let’s repair that MCL”. Our health care is fucked