Mapped: The hospital and A&E waiting lists in your area as Prime Minister vows to fix 'broken' NHS
As Keir Starmer describes the NHS as 'broken but not beaten', new data reveals the scale of the task facing his government.
The Prime Minister blames the previous Conservative government for 'breaking' the healthcare system, and says: "People have the right to be angry". A total of 7.62 million people were on the NHS waiting list in July this year, according to the latest data released today.
That's up from 2.68 million in July 2010, shortly after the Conservative-led coalition came to power. In February 2020, just before the Covid-19 pandemic, 4.54 million people were on the waiting list.
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In Greater Manchester there were 500,317 people on waiting lists in July. That's down from 525,371 people at the same time last year, but higher than the 472,506 people in July 2022.
In February 2020, just before the pandemic, the waiting list in our region was less than half the size it is now, at 236,647 people.
The PM has also highlighted the long waiting times in A&E. More than a third (37.5%) of attendances at major 'type 1' A&Es in August took more than four hours from arrival to admission, transfer or discharge.
That's down marginally from 38.6% in July, and is better than the 40.9% and 42.0% at the same time in each of the last two years respectively. The number of patients waiting in A&E for more than 12 hours fell to 28,494 people in August.
It's down from 54,308 in January and is marginally better than 28,863 in August last year. However, before the Covid pandemic, in August 2019, just 371 people had to wait over 12 hours in A&E.
Some 43.6% of attendances at major A&Es at Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust, Greater Manchester's largest trust