There are now 38,623 people on the waiting list at Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust according to the latest figures – up 11.3% in a year. 1,040 people have been waiting for more than a year for an appointment.

Across the country there have never been more people on the waiting list – more than 5.8 million are currently waiting. Nationally, the standard of 92% of people seen within 18 weeks of a referral has not been met since 2016. Just over 1 in 10 people in England are on the NHS waiting list (10.3 per cent).

Nationally, the NHS is short of 100,000 staff, including 7,000 doctors and 40,000 nurses. In the Budget last month, the Chancellor did not set out a plan to recruit, train, and retain the staff needed to solve this waiting list crisis.

A spokesperson for Mansfield Labour said,

“Waiting lists in the Mansfield district are too long and getting longer. That’s not just a statistic – it’s local people living with real pain, and risk longer than they should.

“This isn’t just about Covid – key targets haven’t been met across the country for years. From waiting lists to A&E to getting an appointment with your local GP, for local people our health service is going backwards.”

Jonathan Ashworth, Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, said:

“We’ve heard serious warnings from hospital chiefs about the unsustainable pressure the NHS is under. These figures are confirmation of the dangerously lengthy waiting times patients are forced to endure and the scale of pressure on overwhelmed A&Es.

“The coming winter weeks are set to be the most challenging in history for the NHS. It’s now urgent Ministers fix the stalling vaccination programme, resolve the immediate crisis in social care and bring forward a long term plan to recruit the health care staff our NHS desperately needs, which Rishi Sunak has failed to provide despite imposing a punishing tax rise on working people.”

ENDS

Notes to Editors:

Latest figures (September 2021) reveal there are now 38,623 people on the waiting list at Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust according to the latest figures – up 11.3% in a year. In September 2020 there were 34,692 waiting. 1,040 people have been waiting for more than a year for an appointment.

There are 5.86 people on the NHS waiting list in England as of September 2021 (adjusted for missing data). This is the highest ever recorded and is due to grow further, with estimates of up to 13 million.

As of September 2021, 300,566 people have been waiting over a year for an appointment.

As of September 2021, 12,491 people have been waiting over two years.

Before the pandemic, the waiting list in England was just over 4.4 million and was growing by about 300,000 a year. We haven’t met the standard of 92% of people seen within 18 weeks since 2016.

Source: NHS England Consultant-led Referral to Treatment Waiting Times Data