Long waits at A&E becoming normal, warn doctors’ groups

Long waiting times in emergency departments are becoming normal, with some patients spending days in A&E wards before they can be moved into other hospital beds, emergency physicians have warned.

Leaders of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) and the Society for Acute Medicine (SAM) said that some hospitals had effectively run out of space, meaning patients could not receive the right care until a bed became free.

NHS figures for September show that 5,025 patients waited for more than 12 hours to be admitted to hospital in England. That is only 1% of the 506,916 admitted via A&Es, but it is more than 10 times as many as the 458 waiting more than 12 hours in September 2019 and nearly twice as many as the January peak of 2,847.

Scientists at the Zoe Covid study said last week that UK cases of coronavirus may have peaked. But the React study at Imperial College found that the R number was between 0.9 and 1.1 with Covid cases at their highest levels.

Pressures on hospitals have prompted the Royal College of Nursing to call for a return to compulsory mask-wearing, while Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, said that ministers should reimpose a legal obligation to wear masks on public transport, allowing police to enforce the law.

Read full story

Source: The Guardian, 7 November 2021