Selasa, 03 Januari 2023

NHS: Government urged to take action over pressures - BBC

Ambulance outside The Royal London HospitalHollie Adams/Getty Images

Ministers are under mounting pressure to respond to "intolerable and unsustainable" pressure facing the NHS.

Senior doctors described the NHS as on a knife edge, with some A&Es in a "complete state of crisis".

Labour criticised the government's management of the health service, while the Liberal Democrats called for Parliament to be recalled early.

Transport Secretary Mark Harper said he recognised staff were under "tremendous pressure".

But he said the government had offered more resources to the NHS and social care to help services cope.

Hospitals are experiencing soaring demand, which experts believe is in part driven by winter illnesses like flu and Covid.

Some 13% of hospital beds in England are filled with people with Covid or flu, NHS England figures showed.

In some places, like Shropshire and Gloucestershire, people are being advised to only visit A&E in extreme circumstances.

In recent days, a number of hospitals have declared critical incidents suggesting they cannot function as usual due to extraordinary pressure.

According to the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM), the NHS is facing the worst winter for A&E waits on record.

Labour's shadow health secretary Wes Streeting said it was "completely inexplicable" that no government ministers had "raised their head or shown their face to say exactly what they are doing to grip this crisis".

He claimed the NHS was "actively deterring" people from going to A&E "because they are overwhelmed".

"And I think that's the sense of jeopardy which is frightening so many people across the country," he told BBC Radio 4's PM programme.

Lib Dem MP Daisy Cooper said Prime Minister Rishi Sunak "must declare a major incident".

"This is a national crisis and the country will never forgive the government if they refuse to recall Parliament."

MPs are due back at Westminster next Monday following their Christmas break.

BBC graph shows a steep rise in the number of patients in hospital with flu in England from 15 Nov to 25 Dec

Prof Phil Banfield, chairman of the British Medical Association, which represents doctors, called on the government to "step up and take immediate action".

He said the survival of Britain's health service was on a knife edge and claimed patients were needlessly dying because of a political choice.

He described the current situation in the NHS as "intolerable and unsustainable".

NHS England chief strategy officer Chris Hopson urged caution when asked about people who may be dying as a result of issues in the health service.

He warned against "jumping to conclusions about excess mortality rates and their cause without a really full and detailed look at the evidence".

Stay home advice

Amid rising cases of flu, Covid and strep A, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) has issued advice urging people to stay home if unwell, and wear a mask if they have to go out.

Prof Susan Hopkins, the UKHSA's chief medical adviser, also asked parents to keep children off school if they are unwell and have a fever.

Graphic showing the delays facing patients this winter

A Department for Health and Social Care spokesperson said: "NHS staff do an incredible job and we recognise the pressures the NHS is facing following the impact of the pandemic.

"That's why we've backed the NHS and social care with up to £14.1bn additional funding over the next two years and this winter we have provided an extra £500m to speed up hospital discharge and free up beds.

"We also awarded a 9.3% pay rise to the lowest earners in the NHS last year.

"The health secretary and ministers have met with unions several times and have been clear their door remains open to further discuss how we can work together to improve the working lives of NHS staff."

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2023-01-03 07:59:23Z
1720648017

Senin, 02 Januari 2023

NHS under more pressure now than at peak of COVID-19 pandemic, leading doctor says - Sky News

Pressure on the NHS is worse now than it was at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, a leading doctor has said.

Dr Tim Cooksley, president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said "urgent action" is required to bring the NHS back from the brink.

Speaking to Sky News, he said the National Health Service is under the most pressure it has ever experienced, including difficult winter periods.

"There has never been a greater recognition amongst all staff that our current situation is worse than it has ever been," Dr Tim Cooksley said.

"And I know that people watching this will say, 'well every winter you have doctors on that say that this winter is terrible, that it's normal winter pressures'.

"But there is a complete acceptance from all colleagues now that this is different from all previous winters - and we need urgent action now."

He added: "This situation is much worse than we experienced under the COVID pandemic at its peak.

"And so we need to think carefully about how we can manage this and I think we need some urgent actions."

Ambulances outside the Royal London Hospital in east London. Ambulance staff in England and Wales walked out on Wednesday, following action by nurses on Tuesday, with the NHS braced for extra pressure as a knock-on effect of the industrial action. Picture date: Thursday December 22, 2022.
Image: Ambulance staff in England and Wales walked out last month following action by nurses

The head of the NHS Confederation, which represents NHS trusts and healthcare leaders, said most of the health service was under "unbearable strain".

Its chief executive Matthew Taylor told Sky News: "I speak to NHS leaders every day and a lot of them, if not most of them, say this is the toughest winter they've ever dealt with. We cannot go on like this.

"Most parts of the health service are under an unbearable strain and that does mean that we're not able to provide service as usual.

"We have to focus all our energies on the most urgent and intense needs, and that's why you're seeing the declaration of critical incidents in so many places."

Sky News understands that at least six hospital trusts are currently dealing with critical incidents, which means they cannot function as usual due to extraordinary pressure.

These critical incidents cover Derbyshire, Nottingham, Dorset, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, Buckinghamshire and Staffordshire.

And at least 55 NHS trusts have publicly stated they are struggling to cope with the demand for their services.

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'We cannot treat people in car parks'

The president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, Dr Adrian Boyle, said on New Year's Day that between 300 and 500 people are dying each week because of delays in emergency care.

He added that a severe flu outbreak, made worse by a lack of immunity in people due to COVID isolation measures, has meant that bed occupancy is at a record level.

Nurses also went on strike over a dispute about pay and conditions for two days in December as did paramedics, and the British Medical Association said it will ballot junior doctors this month.

NHS pressures 'manifesting in different ways'

Meanwhile, another leading health official, Saffron Cordery, said the current pressure on the NHS is "equivalent" to that of the early stage of the pandemic.

Ms Cordery, who is interim chief executive of NHS Providers, said that the pressure is coming from various directions, such as staff shortages, lack of investment, a worn-out workforce and a backlog of operations, as well as a continuation of COVID and flu cases.

"I think we are seeing equivalent levels of pressure, they are just manifesting in different ways," she told PA news agency.

Ambulance workers holds signs as they take part in a strike, amid a dispute with the government over pay, outside NHS London Ambulance Service in London
Image: Ambulance workers hold signs as they take part in a strike

She said the NHS had to deal with "tens of thousands of people coming through hospital doors with a contagious disease" during the pandemic and were forced to give "over nearly every hospital bed to COVID patients".

"What we know now, and I think perhaps it's a more challenging situation, is that we've still got that coming through the door but then we've also got the legacy of COVID, which is a worn-out workforce, we've got even higher levels of staff shortages and vacancies, we're up to 133,000 across the NHS now," Ms Cordery added.

Ms Cordery also said the lack of capital investment in the NHS means it is "much less efficient".

"One of the things we have called for, and we are seeing small steps towards this but I think we need an even greater commitment to it, is a fully costed, fully funded workforce plan for the NHS so that we work out precisely what's needed," she said.

She continued: "If I did have a silver bullet that might solve a significant chunk of this it would be the investment across local government as well as the NHS and the investment in social care, in public health and in prevention because it's the denudation of those services which has had a massive impact on the NHS."

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2023-01-01 23:16:15Z
1720648017

Millions of Britons would find it hard or impossible to cover an extra £20 in monthly expenditure - Sky News

More than a third of adults in the UK would find it difficult or impossible to cover a £20 increase in their monthly expenditure, according to new research.

Citizens Advice commissioned a survey of 2,000 adults between 5 and 9 December and found that one in four would find it somewhat difficult to cover the increase, 7% would find it very difficult and 4% would find it impossible.

Also among those who would find the extra cost difficult or impossible were 58% of those on benefits, 57% of those using pre-payment meters for their energy supply, and 47% of people of colour.

Citizens Advice chief executive Dame Clare Moriarty said: "Millions of households are at financial breaking point: running down savings, going without bare essentials and turning to food banks to get by.

"We're already seeing record numbers of people coming to us for crisis support and this research shows people simply cannot cut back any further.

"Current government support is a sticking plaster which is quickly being exhausted due to the increased pressures people are facing.

"Without further targeted intervention, we risk another year of despair for millions of people."

More from UK

The survey also found that a third of people have had to dip into their savings in the last three months to get by, and more than half of them had either run out of savings or expect to do so in the next three months.

Read more:
Ed Conway: Inflation, gas prices, cost of living crisis and a plummeting pound - 2022 in charts
Cost of living crisis to deepen in 2023 with falling pay and rising bills, warns think tank
Inflation may have peaked but you should still be prepared for a bleak winter ahead

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Britain is witnessing the worst squeeze on incomes in a generation, as struggling households are hit by soaring energy costs and rocketing inflation.

Citizens Advice said it helped a record number of people in December, assisting them in getting emergency grants and referring them to food banks.

Almost three in 10 of those surveyed said they are losing sleep at least once a week because they are worried about their finances.

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2023-01-02 03:39:48Z
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Minggu, 01 Januari 2023

NHS under more pressure now than at peak of COVID-19 pandemic, leading doctor says - Sky News

Pressure on the NHS is worse now than it was at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, a leading doctor has said.

Dr Tim Cooksley, president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said "urgent action" is required to bring the NHS back from the brink.

Speaking to Sky News, he said the National Health Service is under the most pressure it has ever experienced, including difficult winter periods.

"There has never been a greater recognition amongst all staff that our current situation is worse than it has ever been," Dr Tim Cooksley said.

"And I know that people watching this will say, 'well every winter you have doctors on that say that this winter is terrible, that it's normal winter pressures'.

"But there is a complete acceptance from all colleagues now that this is different from all previous winters - and we need urgent action now."

He added: "This situation is much worse than we experienced under the COVID pandemic at its peak.

"And so we need to think carefully about how we can manage this and I think we need some urgent actions."

His comments come after the president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, Dr Adrian Boyle, said on New Year's Day that between 300 and 500 people are dying each week because of delays in emergency care.

He added that a severe flu outbreak, made worse by a lack of immunity in people due to COVID isolation measures, has meant that bed occupancy is at a record level.

Nurses also went on strike over a dispute about pay and conditions for two days in December as did paramedics, and the British Medical Association said it will ballot junior doctors this month.

NHS pressures 'manifesting in different ways'

Meanwhile, another leading health official, Saffron Cordery, said the current pressure on the NHS is "equivalent" to that of the early stage of the pandemic.

Ms Cordery, who is interim chief executive of NHS Providers, said that the pressure is coming from various directions, such as staff shortages, lack of investment, a worn-out workforce and a backlog of operations, as well as a continuation of COVID and flu cases.

"I think we are seeing equivalent levels of pressure, they are just manifesting in different ways," she told PA news agency.

Ambulance workers holds signs as they take part in a strike, amid a dispute with the government over pay, outside NHS London Ambulance Service in London
Image: Ambulance workers hold signs as they take part in a strike

She said the NHS had to deal with "tens of thousands of people coming through hospital doors with a contagious disease" during the pandemic and were forced to give "over nearly every hospital bed to COVID patients".

"What we know now, and I think perhaps it's a more challenging situation, is that we've still got that coming through the door but then we've also got the legacy of COVID, which is a worn-out workforce, we've got even higher levels of staff shortages and vacancies, we're up to 133,000 across the NHS now," Ms Cordery added.

Ms Cordery also said the lack of capital investment in the NHS means it is "much less efficient".

"One of the things we have called for, and we are seeing small steps towards this but I think we need an even greater commitment to it, is a fully costed, fully funded workforce plan for the NHS so that we work out precisely what's needed," she said.

She continued: "If I did have a silver bullet that might solve a significant chunk of this it would be the investment across local government as well as the NHS and the investment in social care, in public health and in prevention because it's the denudation of those services which has had a massive impact on the NHS."

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2023-01-01 22:52:11Z
1720648017

Scarborough's New Year fireworks cancelled to protect walrus - BBC

Thor the walrusStuart Ford / PA

A New Year's Eve fireworks display had to be cancelled at the last minute to protect an Arctic walrus discovered in Scarborough.

The event was called off over fears it "could cause distress to the mammal".

Council leader Steve Siddons said he was disappointed but "the welfare of the walrus has to take precedence".

The walrus, which has drawn huge crowds since arriving on Saturday, is believed to be the same one spotted on the Hampshire coast three weeks ago.

Mr Siddons said the decision to cancel the event was made on the advice of the British Divers Marine Life Rescue (BDMLR), who have been monitoring the marine mammal.

Wildlife experts have suggested the walrus - nicknamed Thor - may be "taking a break" and will move on in a few days once he is rested enough to continue his journey north.

Walrus sleeping on slipway
Stuart Ford / PA

On Saturday, a cordon was put around the animal after sightseers turned up to catch a glimpse, with one local describing the crowds as like a summer's day in the seaside resort.

Chris Cook, from the BDMLR charity said that Thor should not be disturbed.

"We welcome the decision to call off the fireworks but understand that some people will be disappointed the display isn't going ahead," he said.

"It is extremely rare that an Arctic walrus should come ashore on the Yorkshire coast.

"The creature needs time to rest and recuperate before it continues its journey."

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Record number of people cross Channel to UK in small boats in 2022 - as arrivals soar by 60% in a year - Sky News

A record 45,728 people crossed the English Channel to the UK on small boats in 2022, up more than 60% on the previous year as migrants continue to risk their lives making the dangerous journey.

The perils of the deep waters separating France and Britain were once again brought painfully into the spotlight over the last 12 months, when four people lost their lives after their boat capsized in freezing waters in December.

It was a year where the government continued to promise tough measures to stop the flow of boats and crack down on people smugglers, including pursuing its controversial Rwanda deportation scheme.

But data on the numbers of arrivals - compiled and analysed by Sky News - shows a different picture.

The figures, based on provisional data released daily and weekly by the government, show a sharp rise in the number of arrivals last year, a continuation of a years-long trend that shows no signs of stopping.

At least 45,728 people are believed to have crossed the Channel to the UK in small boats in 2022, an increase of more than 17,000 on the 28,526 who arrived in 2021.

Figures released by the government on New Year's Day were very similar, with the final number being confirmed as 45,756.

More on Migrant Crisis

Last year, 1,104 boats succeeded in reaching the UK, a small increase on the 1,034 that made the journey in 2021.

This sheds light once again on one of the most concerning trends - smugglers are packing more and more people aboard larger and larger dinghies, sometimes with deadly consequences.

In 2020, an average of 13 people were aboard each dinghy, Sky News analysis shows, rising to 28 the following year.

Last year that number rose again to 41, rising as high as 45 people per boat in the second half of the year.

Almost 44% of days saw at least one person make the life-threatening journey to the UK, with arrivals on 159 separate days.

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Why do people cross the Channel?

Read more:
People waiting to cross the Channel say they have 'no choice'
'The cruel Channel killed them'

A decline in the use of ferries by people seeking to reach Britain - exacerbated by the pandemic - has seen the number of people using dinghies spike in recent years.

Arrivals have increased by more than 15,000% from 2018, when just 299 people made the crossing by boat.

Numbers of overall asylum applications, however, have modestly increased over the past few years - suggesting that it is the method of reaching the UK that has shifted more than numbers of people.

Despite the increasing numbers, the UK's small boat arrivals continue to be much lower than the number of people arriving in Europe.

At least 154,290 people arrived in Europe via the Mediterranean by land and sea in 2022, according to data from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

At least 1,939 people are estimated to be dead or missing, according to the same data.

Steve Valdez-Symonds, Amnesty International UK's refugee and migrant rights director, said: "Just like last year, 2022 is coming to a close after yet more deeply tragic and largely avoidable deaths in the Channel.

"Shamefully, even this latest disaster hasn't shaken the Government out of its cruel and punitive asylum policies, including the scapegoating of people arriving by small boats.

"The Home Office's own data speaks volumes: most people arriving in the UK are from countries like Iran, Afghanistan, Syria and Eritrea where torture, terror and brutal repression are rife."

He called for "fundamental political change" and safe routes to asylum in the UK for people fleeing persecution, as well as an "end to mass detention".

A government spokesperson said: "The global migration crisis is causing an unprecedented strain on our asylum system.

"Nobody should put their lives at risk by taking dangerous and illegal journeys.

"We will go further to tackle the gangs driving this, using every tool at our disposal to deter illegal migration and disrupt the business model of people smugglers.''

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Sabtu, 31 Desember 2022

Climber dies and another injured after avalanche on Ben Nevis - Sky News

A climber has died and another was injured after an avalanche on the north face of Ben Nevis.

Police Scotland said they were made aware of the avalanche at around 3.35pm on Friday.

The Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team and a helicopter were dispatched to help two climbers, amid challenging weather conditions.

A 48-year-old man was pronounced dead at the scene and a 40-year-old was taken to hospital for treatment.

A spokesperson for the rescue team said they were called out after being alerted to the avalanche and located the two casualties.

They added: "Sadly one had sustained fatal injuries and the other was seriously injured after a slide of 600 metres (approximately).

"With the weather creating some challenging conditions the helicopter was limited to the assistance it could offer."

It took eight hours to transfer the casualties to hospital amid the tough conditions, the spokesperson said.

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2022-12-31 20:27:16Z
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