Bold reality check: the growing gap between urgent care demand and available resources is driving people away from A&E untreated, and that trend has surged dramatically over six years.
A new analysis of NHS data by the Royal College of Nursing reveals a sharp rise in patients leaving emergency departments without receiving care. In the July–September 2025 window, more than 320,000 people walked out untreated, a rate more than three times higher than the same period in 2019 (when just under 100,000 left without treatment).
Most walkouts stem from long waits, but the data also show a dramatic increase in extremely long waits: the number of patients waiting more than 12 hours jumped from 1,281 in 2019 to 116,141 in 2025 — a roughly 90-fold rise.
Prof Nicola Ranger, general secretary and chief executive of the RCN, criticized the response to the crisis as unacceptable. She described the trend as dangerous and indicative of a broken system: when primary and community care services are under-resourced, people end up in A&E; meanwhile, those already in hospital and ready for discharge are held back by inadequate support in the community. The result is jammed acute services, exhausted staff, and patients leaving frustrated — potentially returning in worse health.
A separate LaingBuisson report on private healthcare pressures suggests the NHS could face greater strain if more patients turn away from private options. Although NHS-funded care delivered by independent acute hospitals hit a record £2.2 billion in 2024, private self-funding rose only slightly by 0.1% that year. While cheaper private diagnostic services remained resilient, broader economic concerns and rising living costs lead many to rely on the NHS for high-cost surgeries, even if it means delays.
If self-funders start reverting to NHS services, the burden on the NHS could intensify further. Dr John Puntis, co-chair of Keep Our NHS Public, argues that outsourcing to private providers is not a sustainable solution. He notes that private hospitals depend on the same overstretched workforce, so channeling more NHS money there drains an already thin staff pool. The remedy, he argues, is investing in NHS staff, services, and capacity so that people don’t feel compelled to turn to private care.
In response, a Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson stated that care in corridors is unacceptable and promises to end this practice. They referenced corridor-waiting data as a tool to drive reforms and said significant winter investments are planned: nearly £450 million to expand same-day and urgent care, upgrades to up to 500 ambulances, new mental health crisis centers, and greater local authority power to tailor solutions.
Key takeaway: demand for urgent hospital care is expanding faster than the system’s capacity to deliver timely treatment, and multiple voices are calling for a reallocation of resources toward primary, community, and NHS staffing to prevent out-of-hospital bottlenecks and avoid compromising patient health.
