Cuts in England mean less per patient over the next four years

NHS cuts mean £400 less per person in England over next four years.

The health service in England will have £400 (455; $620) less on average to spend on every man, woman, and child over the next four years because of cutbacks planned for the NHS, a campaigning group has estimated.

The group, Health Emergency, claims that the savings will be made by cutting staff, reducing numbers of hospital beds, reducing the capacity of emergency departments, slashing GPs’ consultation times, and scrapping other primary care services.

It says that seven of the 10 strategic health authorities in England have published plans for cutting a combined total of £15bn from their budgets up to 2014. Similar cuts from the remaining three authorities (North East, Yorkshire and Humber, and East of England) would bring the total to £20bn, averaging almost £400 per head for every person in England, say the campaigners.

The biggest cut (averaging £673 per head of population) will be in London.

Further on this article by Zosia Kmietowicz at BMJ 2010;340:c816.

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