The latest NHS performance data released today (13 January) shows the number of people in England waiting to start routine hospital treatment has risen to six million, 12,986 people had to wait more than 12 hours in A&E departments and 120,218 people waited at least four hours in A&E from the decision to admit to admission.
Dr Tim Cooksley, president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said:
“Here we are another month on with a further shocking set of data which highlights how so many patients are being let down as well as the strain our exhausted staff are under.
“Behind every data point is a person and we can’t allow anyone to forget that.
“There are also amazing staff on the ground who continue to provide the best care they can in the most challenging of circumstances and seeing this data is demoralising for us all.
“We need to focus on why performance has continued to fall and struggle for years and build the solutions to drive improvement in both the short and long term. This is an increasingly serious situation.”