View all newsletters
Sign up to our newsletters

Support 110 years of independent journalism.

  1. Spotlight on Policy
  2. Healthcare
13 July 2022updated 27 Jul 2022 9:49am

Hospitals are under pressure from Covid-19 once again

There is a shortage of hospital beds and ambulances, but Conservative leadership candidates would rather talk tax cuts.

One topic the Conservative leadership candidates have been reluctant to discuss so far is the continuing strain on the NHS posed by Covid-19

Despite the NHS backlog continuing to grow (6.48 million people are now waiting for treatment in England), so far only Jeremy Hunt and Tom Tugendhat have made health service policy statements, with Hunt having committed to keep the Health and Social Care Levy (and bring back family doctors), and Tugendhat committing to reintroduce a binding A&E and referrals target.

The Covid-19 virus hasn’t gone away – staffing levels continue to be affected, and a new wave caused by the latest BA.4 and BA.5 strains of the Omicron variant is putting pressure on beds. Covid-19 is much less deadly than it was, thanks mainly to the vaccination programme, as well as Omicron taking over from the more severe Delta variant. However, the percentage of people testing positive is rising.

The latest figures from the ONS show just under 4 per cent of people in England were testing positive for Covid-19 in the week ending 29 June, up from just over 3 per cent a week earlier. In Northern Ireland 5.4 per cent tested positive (up from 3.7 per cent the previous week), Wales saw 4.9 per cent testing positive (up from 3.2 per cent), and in Scotland 5.9 per cent tested positive in the week ending 30 June (up from 5.2 per cent).

The rise in infections is slowly but surely putting a strain on hospital beds. As of 5 July, more than 11,000 hospital beds in England were occupied by Covid-19 patients – the highest figure since April 26, during the Omicron BA.2 wave. Staff absences are also rising, reaching 10,823 on 8 June – the highest figure since 18 May. The Health Service Journal has reported that all ten ambulance trusts in England are now on the highest alert level due to the heatwave and high staff absence rates due to Covid-19.

Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com Our Thursday ideas newsletter, delving into philosophy, criticism, and intellectual history. The best way to sign up for The Salvo is via thesalvo.substack.com Stay up to date with NS events, subscription offers & updates. Weekly analysis of the shift to a new economy from the New Statesman's Spotlight on Policy team. The best way to sign up for The Green Transition is via spotlightonpolicy.substack.com
  • Administration / Office
  • Arts and Culture
  • Board Member
  • Business / Corporate Services
  • Client / Customer Services
  • Communications
  • Construction, Works, Engineering
  • Education, Curriculum and Teaching
  • Environment, Conservation and NRM
  • Facility / Grounds Management and Maintenance
  • Finance Management
  • Health - Medical and Nursing Management
  • HR, Training and Organisational Development
  • Information and Communications Technology
  • Information Services, Statistics, Records, Archives
  • Infrastructure Management - Transport, Utilities
  • Legal Officers and Practitioners
  • Librarians and Library Management
  • Management
  • Marketing
  • OH&S, Risk Management
  • Operations Management
  • Planning, Policy, Strategy
  • Printing, Design, Publishing, Web
  • Projects, Programs and Advisors
  • Property, Assets and Fleet Management
  • Public Relations and Media
  • Purchasing and Procurement
  • Quality Management
  • Science and Technical Research and Development
  • Security and Law Enforcement
  • Service Delivery
  • Sport and Recreation
  • Travel, Accommodation, Tourism
  • Wellbeing, Community / Social Services
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
THANK YOU

The interim chief executive of NHS Providers, Saffron Cordery, said: “The road ahead will be rocky if overstretched NHS staff and services, already working flat out to bring down waiting lists and facing a range of other pressures, have to deal with more and more Covid-19 cases added to the threat of an early wave of flu and a heatwave next week, which will affect many people’s health.

“And at a time when our politicians have crunch decisions to make on big issues for the NHS – such as the roll-out of more Covid-19 booster jabs, how we continue to manage and ‘live with’ the virus, and a pay rise for staff – the uncertain political backdrop is unsettling.

“It’s shaping up to be a very challenging summer, autumn and winter for an under pressure NHS. Trust leaders are doing all they can to plan and prepare for difficult days ahead.”

NHS England figures show that some hospital trusts are now more than 99 per cent full when it comes to beds – and not all of the empty ones are available to non-Covid-19 patients. The worst-hit region is the south-west, which had 96.5 per cent of general, acute and adult critical care beds occupied as of 5 July, with only 2.7 per cent of beds available to non-Covid-19 patients. You can see the worst-hit trusts in the table below.

Reacting to the latest ONS figures on Covid prevalence, Mark Woolhouse, professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh, said: “There is no reason to expect that waves of Covid-19 associated with new variants will stop any time soon, so we need to plan for a continued strain on the NHS. 

“We should not think of ‘living with Covid’ as a strategy; it is simply an acceptance of reality. We are going to need a long-term public health strategy for living with Covid.”

[See also: How worried should we be about the new Covid wave?]

Content from our partners
The promise of prevention
How Labour hopes to make the UK a leader in green energy
Is now the time to rethink health and care for older people? With Age UK

Topics in this article : , , ,
Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com Our Thursday ideas newsletter, delving into philosophy, criticism, and intellectual history. The best way to sign up for The Salvo is via thesalvo.substack.com Stay up to date with NS events, subscription offers & updates. Weekly analysis of the shift to a new economy from the New Statesman's Spotlight on Policy team. The best way to sign up for The Green Transition is via spotlightonpolicy.substack.com
  • Administration / Office
  • Arts and Culture
  • Board Member
  • Business / Corporate Services
  • Client / Customer Services
  • Communications
  • Construction, Works, Engineering
  • Education, Curriculum and Teaching
  • Environment, Conservation and NRM
  • Facility / Grounds Management and Maintenance
  • Finance Management
  • Health - Medical and Nursing Management
  • HR, Training and Organisational Development
  • Information and Communications Technology
  • Information Services, Statistics, Records, Archives
  • Infrastructure Management - Transport, Utilities
  • Legal Officers and Practitioners
  • Librarians and Library Management
  • Management
  • Marketing
  • OH&S, Risk Management
  • Operations Management
  • Planning, Policy, Strategy
  • Printing, Design, Publishing, Web
  • Projects, Programs and Advisors
  • Property, Assets and Fleet Management
  • Public Relations and Media
  • Purchasing and Procurement
  • Quality Management
  • Science and Technical Research and Development
  • Security and Law Enforcement
  • Service Delivery
  • Sport and Recreation
  • Travel, Accommodation, Tourism
  • Wellbeing, Community / Social Services
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
THANK YOU