that's going to be localised though

Eg I'm not aware that A&E capacity around this way has gone down, although admissions and waiting times seem to be up.

+1m admissions over the past year nationally is going to put a strain on any system - cuts to existing A&E services alone aren't the only cause (particularly given that in some hopsitals A&E services have been boosted, but they are still missing targets).

More focus needs to go on the out-of-hours situation (lack of GP availability (Labour) and lack of alternative provision (Tories) and lack of common sense amongst the public about what is and what isn't a genuine reason to go to A&E for (which I suspect is a big chunk of it).

The elephant in the room being lack of capacity in the social care system for our aging population - which is both a Government issue (funding) and social issue (whether families should be taking more responsibility for the care of elderly relatives?)

Simply blaming Government cuts misses the woods for the trees - there's far more to it all IMO.

Posted By: CWC, Jun 4, 14:27:22