Will the NHS be overwhelmed this winter? The current situation explained in 7 charts

The World Health Organisation has warned that all countries must prepare for a surge in Omicron coronavirus cases - but how prepared is England’s health service for another deadly wave of the disease?

Since the start of the pandemic England’s healthcare system has been under acute pressure.

Now with the emergence of the new variant there are fears the virus could evade vaccination and spark a surge in cases and hospitalisations, putting the NHS under further strain.

NationalWorld has analysed the latest health data sourced from the NHS and the UK Government to reveal how much pressure the health service is under as we enter the winter months.

How many people are in hospital with coronavirus?

The number of people in hospital with coronavirus has fallen dramatically since mass vaccination began at the start of the year. Recently the number of people in hospital with the coronavirus rose in October but dropped again in November.

But as of 3 December there were more than 5,800 people in hospital, including more than 780 on mechanical ventilator beds.

How many critical care beds are available?

Critical care beds are available for the most seriously ill people who require constant care and monitoring. Despite hospitals rearranging beds early in the pandemic to free up more Covid beds, there is finite space and, simply put, the more that are occupied with coronavirus patients, the less that will be available for people with non-Covid related illnesses.

The proportion of critical care beds taken up by Covid patients has increased since summer.

However, it has been relatively stable throughout November with an average of 906 critical care patients in hospital each day.

The number of available critical care beds available to non-Covid patients has also remained steady throughout the month. As of 30 November there were 572 critical care beds available to non-Covid patients, 77 fewer than the day before. For Covid patients there were 256 beds available, two fewer than the previous day.

How many NHS workers are off with coronavirus?

Despite more than 80% of over 12s in England being fully vaccinated against the disease, thousands of NHS workers are unable to work each day either as a result of contracting coronavirus or because they have to self-isolate.

The most recent available data shows 15,008 were off sick with coronavirus on 3 November – although that is almost half of the peak on 20 July when 27,116 were off sick.

Since the start of autumn and 3 November, an average of 15,274 workers were off each day because of the virus.

There are approximately 1.2 million people working for the NHS in England.

How long are people waiting to see a GP?

Figures show 30.2 million people in England scheduled an appointment with their GP surgery in October. While 40% (12.2 million) were booked in for the same day, millions waited more than two weeks - 4.3 million people waited more than 15 days for an appointment, with 1.2 million waiting more than 28 days.

How long are people waiting at A&E?

In October more than half a million people waited more than four hours at A & E (based on the time between arrival to either admission, transfer or discharge). At 23% of the 2.2 million people who attended A&E, that was both the highest proportion and the highest overall number recorded this year.

The number of people attending emergency departments has increased since the start of the year – 1.3 million attended in January in comparison to 2.2 million in October. This is largely due to people avoiding A & E during last winter’s surge in coronavirus cases.

How long are people waiting for an ambulance to arrive?

People in need of emergency treatment are waiting record lengths of time for an ambulance.

In October ambulances took on average 9 minutes and 20 seconds to respond to a category 1 (C1) call out - this is the longest waiting time since current records began in August 2017. C1 calls are  the most serious, and relate to a person in a life threatening condition, including cardiac arrests.

The average response time for the second most serious category (C2) is just under an hour at 53 minutes 54 seconds.

How long are people waiting for cancer treatment?

The NHS states 85% of cancer patients urgently referred by a GP should start treatment within two months (62 days) but the last time this target was met was in 2013/14.

Between April and September this year, of 2021/22 83,535 patients started treatment. Of these, 60,137 (72%) were seen within two months, with 23,398 (28%)  waiting longer than the target window.

But in September alone, the proportion seen within two months had plummeted to 68% – the worst since records began in October 2009.

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