NHS cancels non-urgent ops to free up 30,000 beds
CORONAVIRUS: THE
Hanna Geissler
THE NHS is cancelling non-urgent operations for three months in a bid to free up 30,000 hospital beds.
Sir Simon Stevens, chief executive of the NHS, said the health service is pulling out all the stops to prepare for a surge in demand when the coronavirus crisis peaks.
Some 4,000 more ventilators will be procured to boost England’s supply, he added.
The reassurance came as Sir Patrick Vallance, the UK’s Chief Scientific Adviser, said 55,000 people are now believed to be infected in the UK. He told the
Health Select Committee that it was hoped social distancing measures introduced this week would reduce the number of deaths to 20,000.
He said: “Every year in seasonal flu the number of deaths is thought to be 8,000.
“If we can get this [coronavirus deaths] down to numbers 20,000 and below, that is a good outcome in terms of where we would hope to get to with this outbreak.
“But that’s still horrible, it’s still an enormous number of deaths and an enormous pressure on the health service, and having spent 20 years as an NHS consultant as well as an academic, I know what that looks and feels like.”
Questioned by the committee about how well prepared the NHS was for an epidemic, Sir Simon said urgent action was being taken.
Non-urgent operations will be cancelled for three months from April 15 to free up 30,000 of England’s 98,000 hospital beds for coronavirus patients.
A letter to senior managers and hospital trusts also instructed them to “urgently discharge all hospital inpatients who are medically fit to leave”.
Emergency admissions, cancer treatment and other clinically urgent care should continue unaffected.
Advice
Sir Simon refused to say whether he was confident the country would have enough intensive care beds for the most seriously ill.
He told committee chairman Jeremy Hunt this would partly depend on whether the British public follow Government advice. This is, obviously, an unprecedented global health threat,” Sir Simon said. “Unmitigated, there is no health service in the world that would be able to cope if this virus let rip and therefore it is crucially important that the measures that were set out by Public Health England and the Government yesterday take effect in order to reduce the infection rate, such that the peak pressure on the NHS is moderated.
“In the meantime, what the NHS is doing is pulling out all the stops to make sure we have got as many staff and beds and other facilities available, including critical care, for that peak demand.”
Sir Simon said the NHS in England currently has 6,699 adult ventilators and 750 paediatric ones which can be repurposed.
There are 691 available in the private sector, and 35 in the ministry of defence.
He said the total figure of 8,175 would be increased to 12,000 in the coming weeks.
Production of protective equipment, such as gowns and face