NHS A&E departments suffer worst performance on record
NHS accident and emergency departments in England recorded their lowest-ever performance in December. The latest figures show 79.8% of patients were seen within four hours in all A&E departments last month, compared with 81.4% in November 2019 and 86.5% in December 2018. It comes as pressures on the health service continue to grow. The number of patients visiting A&E departments in December increased 6.5% on the same month last year, with 2,181,024 people attending. There were 560,801 emergency admissions in the month, 2.9% higher than the same month last year.
There were 4.6 million people on the waiting list to start treatment as of the end of November 2019, up from 4.4 million.