Hospital waiting lists rise for the first time in seven months

The list hit a record high in September, with 7.77 million treatments and 6.50 million patients. Credit: PA

The NHS waiting list for routine hospital treatments in England has risen for the first time in seven months, new figures have revealed.

At the end of April this year, 7.57 million treatments were waiting to be carried out, affecting 6.33 million patients.

According to NHS England, this is up slightly from 7.54 million pending treatments and 6.29 million patients left waiting at the end of March.

Waiting lists have often taken centre stage in political debates leading up to the July 2024 General Election.

Rishi Sunak pledged to tackle the number in January 2023, when it stood at 7.21 million treatments waiting to be carried out.

During a Sky News interview on Wednesday, the prime minister admitted: “We’ve not made as much progress on cutting waiting lists as I would have liked.”

The list hit a record high in September 2023, with 7.77 million treatments and 6.50 million patients.

Sir Keir Starmer vowed that one of the first steps of a Labour government would be to bring down waiting lists by creating 40,000 new appointments per week.

Daisy Cooper, health spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats, called on Mr Sunak “to apologise to the public for his failure to get NHS waiting lists down instead of ducking responsibility”.

The number of those who have faced waiting more than 65 weeks to start treatment has also gone up, from over 48,968 people in March to over 50,000 in April.

The government originally set a target of eliminating 65-week-long waits by March 2024 - but this has now been moved to September 2024.

Professor Vivien Lees, vice president of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, also warned that the “NHS won’t stand a chance of cutting waiting times without significant additional investment”.

This follows figures from Cancer Research UK, which show more than 380,000 cancer patients have not been treated on time since 2015.

Want a quick and expert briefing on the biggest news stories? Listen to our latest podcasts to find out What You Need To Know...