Britain’s struggling National Health Service (NHS) will expand the use of so-called community diagnostic centres, Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced yesterday, as his Labour government bids to cut hospital backlogs. The new plan, which also includes increasing private sector involvement and the use of technology alongside other steps, aims to free up millions of hospital appointment slots.Starmer’s government – elected last July – has vowed to revitalise the overburdened NHS, which has nearly 7.5mn patients languishing on waiting lists.It is aiming to hit a target of 92% of patients getting a referral appointment within 18 weeks by the end of this parliament in 2029. Currently, four in 10 people have waited longer than the target. “This is the year we roll up our sleeves and reform the NHS,” Starmer said in a speech at a hospital in Surrey, southeast England.The UK leader promised “a new era of convenience in care”, calling community diagnostic centres a “game-changer” and promising more of them alongside 17 new or expanded surgical hubs. “We will open them, more of them – and they will be seven days-a-week, 12 hours-a-day,” he added of the diagnostic centres, arguing they will deliver 440,000 extra tests and scans every year. “So that if you need a scan or an X-ray, you get it done much more quickly – and at your convenience.”The plan also includes a new agreement increasing the role of private healthcare in some sectors. This is typically contentious in Britain, where some fear the creep of private providers into the publicly-funded system will undermine it. “I know some people won’t like this, but I make no apologies,” Starmer insisted, adding “change is urgent”. “I’m not interested in putting ideology before patients.”As Britain’s National Health Service struggles with underfunding and long waiting times, private healthcare providers are sweeping in. But patients have been increasingly relying on private healthcare providers as the NHS’s problems mount. “To bypass the long NHS waiting lists, many patients have turned to private options for healthcare to receive faster care,” Louis Sharpe, healthcare analyst at business intelligence firm LaingBuisson, told AFP.The private market for acute health care is now valued at £12.4bn ($15.5bn), according to the firm, driven primarily by ophthalmology and orthopaedics – two specialities with the longest NHS waiting times. In private hospitals alone, the acute care market grew 35% between 2019 and 2023, reaching a record size of nearly £7bn. Private healthcare has long been contentious in Britain, where many fear the creep of private providers will undermine the publicly-funded system.Almost a third of Britons have accessed private healthcare at some point, many motivated by faster access to doctors appointments, according to a report by the Independent Healthcare Provider Network. The country’s largest private hospitals all saw their turnover increase in 2023.Spire Healthcare, Circle Health Group and Nuffield Health each saw their revenue rise by more than 10% last year to over a billion pounds. The trend has also boosted the insurance industry.The number of people with private health coverage increased 7% last year to 6.2mn.While the majority get coverage through their employer, patients are also becoming increasingly willing to pay for care in private hospitals themselves. The market for “self-pay” care in private hospitals increased by over 60% in 2023 compared to 2017 levels, noted LaingBuisson. However, despite the surge in private players in the UK, “the NHS remains by far the most dominant supplier of healthcare in the UK, and this is unlikely to change in the near future,” Sharpe added.
