The four-hour A&E target is a sham. Hospitals are gaming the numbers and the sickest are left at risk

In the next few days, once the data has been collected, the Government will come out and say that, thanks to its policies, the situation in A&E is improving.

Despite estimates released recently by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine that soaring waits for A&E beds led to more than 250 needless deaths a week in England alone last year, the Government will point to declining numbers of patients who breached the four-hour target this March.

The four-hour target means we're meant to see and either discharge or admit patients within four hours of their arriving in A&E.

But it's a sham, writes Professor Rob Galloway in the Daily Mail. Because, for the past month, the four-hour data has been manipulated, the result of two policies introduced earlier in the month by the Government.

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Source: Daily Mail, 3 April 2024