Private health bills for much-needed procedures reach £15,000 as backlog dogs NHS | Personal Finance | Finance
A record number of Britons are paying for private hospital treatment against the backdrop of long delays on the NHS.
Despite the cost-of-living crisis dogging Britain, there were nearly 900,000 admissions to private hospitals in the UK in 2023, which was up by seven percent on 2022.
It comes just weeks after reports that spending on private health care surged to an all-time high. And though free prescriptions are available on the NHS for certain people, patients are opting to have vital surgeries privately to dodge massive waiting lists on the national provider.
Cataract surgery was the most popular private procedure (71,575) in 2023, followed by chemotherapy (66,210).
Hip and knee replacements, colonoscopies and endoscopies were other in-demand options despite some treatments costing more than £15,000.
Data on the number of Brits deserting the NHS was published by the Private Healthcare Information Network (PHIN), which shares information about performance and fees of private consultants and hospitals.
The PHIN data shows Northern Ireland saw the highest surge n private hospital admissions in 2023 – up 56 percent on 2022.
There was a rise of 11 percent in Scotland with 7 percent more admissions in Wales and 6 percent in England.
More people are relying on private health insurance to bypass the NHS with a rise in the number of treatments paid for via this route up from 561,000 to 521,000.
The number of operations that were self funded rose from 275,000 to 278,000.
Latest NHS data shows 309,300 people in England had been waiting more than 52 weeks to start routine hospital treatment at the end of March, up from 305,050 at the end of February.
The Government and NHS England have set the ambition of eliminating all waits of more than a year by March 2025. But there were still 48,968 patients who had been waiting more than 65 weeks to start treatment at the end of March, down from 75,004 in February.
Last week the British Medical Association (BMA) also announced junior doctors in England will stage a six-day walkout from June 27 to 7am on July 2 — just 48 hours before the general election.
