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The government is turning to the private sector in an attempt to cut NHS waiting lists.

Thirteen new community diagnostics centres (CDCs) will be opened across England to carry out an additional 742,000 scans, checks and tests per year.

Eight of the new facilities will be operated by the private sector – but despite this, all services will remain free to patients.

NHS waiting lists stood at 7.47 million at the end of May, the highest number since records began in 2007.

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Can waiting lists come down?

Mr Sunak made cutting NHS waiting lists one of his five priorities to the public in a speech he gave in January – but last month, he said industrial action in the health service had made his mission “more challenging”.

Analysis by Sky News carried out in May found that the number of people waiting more than a year for hospital treatment is 186 times higher than before the pandemic began.

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At the end of February, 300,000 people in England had been waiting for more than a year since being referred by a consultant. Two years ago, in February 2020, that figure was below 2,000.

Junior doctors are currently preparing for another four-day strike beginning on 11 August, while consultants are set to walk out for 48 hours from 24 August in an ongoing dispute with the government over pay and working conditions.

Health Secretary Steve Barclay said: “We must use every available resource to deliver life-saving checks to ease pressure on the NHS.

“By making use of the available capacity in the independent sector, and enabling patients to access this diagnostic capacity free at the point of need, we can offer patients a wider choice of venues to receive treatment and in doing so diagnose major illnesses quicker and start treatments sooner.”

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‘We’re not being honest about healthcare’

The development is likely to reignite the debate over private sector involvement in the NHS, a concept that is fiercely resisted by campaigners who fear any potential shift towards US-style private healthcare.

In an exclusive interview with Sky News last month, former prime minister Sir Tony Blair said the NHS was “not serving its purpose” and warned: “The truth is, you’re not going to have a lot more money to spend, but you do have to think how do we do things completely differently.”

He said there should be more private sector involvement in the NHS and that there should be “complete cooperation between the public and private sector”.

During his campaign to be Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer pledged to introduce common ownership of Britain’s utilities – including rail, mail, energy and water – saying “public services should be in public hands”.

He also promised to “end outsourcing in our NHS, local government and justice system.”

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Tony Blair: ‘NHS not serving its purpose’

However, in an interview with Sky News’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday programme in January, the Labour leader backtracked on that pledge, saying: “We’re not talking about privatising the NHS. The NHS has always used elements from the private sector, GPs are an example of that.

“Outsourcing of some issues and functions I don’t think has been very effective.”

And in its response to the new centres announced today, Labour said the government is currently not making enough use of private capacity – claiming that 331,000 patients waiting for NHS care could have been treated since January 2022.

Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting said: “The Conservatives are failing to make use of private sector capacity and patients are paying the price.

“No one should be waiting in pain while hospital beds that could be used lie empty. The next Labour government will use spare capacity in the private sector to get patients seen faster.”

Read more:
GPs given new powers to fast-track heart and respiratory checks
One in five adults in England will be living with major diseases by 2040, say researchers

The private centres announced today will operate in a similar way to those run by the NHS, but staff will be employed by private operators, which also own the buildings.

Sites in the South West – located in Redruth, Bristol, Torbay, Yeovil and Weston-super-Mare – will be operated by diagnostics company InHealth.

The others are located in Southend, Northampton and south Birmingham – and join the four already operating in Brighton, north Solihull, Oxford and Salford.

The new NHS-run sites are in Hornchurch, Skegness, Lincoln, Nottingham and Stoke-on-Trent.

The government vowed to open 160 CDCs by 2030. Currently, 114 are operating and they have carried out 4.6 million tests, checks and scans since July 2021.

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25% of young children and pregnant women malnourished in Gaza, charity says, as PM vows to fly critical medical cases to UK

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25% of young children and pregnant women malnourished in Gaza, charity says, as PM vows to fly critical medical cases to UK

A charity has warned 25% of young children and pregnant women in Gaza are now malnourished, with Sir Keir Starmer vowing to evacuate children who need “critical medical assistance” to the UK.

MSF, also known as Doctors Without Borders, said Israel’s “deliberate use of starvation as a weapon” has reached unprecedented levels – with patients and healthcare workers both fighting to survive.

It claimed that, at one of its clinics in Gaza City, rates of severe malnutrition in children under five have trebled over the past two weeks – and described the lack of food and water on the ground as “unconscionable”.

Pic: Reuters
Image:
Pic: Reuters

The charity also criticised the high number of fatalities seen at aid distribution sites, with one British surgeon accusing IDF soldiers of shooting civilians “almost like a game of target practice”.

MSF’s deputy medical coordinator in Gaza, Dr Mohammed Abu Mughaisib, said: “Those who go to the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation’s food distributions know that they have the same chance of receiving a sack of flour as they do of leaving with a bullet in their head.”

The UN also estimates that Israeli forces have killed more than 1,000 people seeking food – the majority near the militarised distribution sites of the US-backed aid distribution scheme run by the GHF.

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‘Many more deaths unless Israelis allow food in’

In a statement on Friday, the IDF had said it “categorically rejects the claims of intentional harm to civilians”, and reports of incidents at aid distribution sites were “under examination”.

The GHF has also previously disputed that these deaths were connected with its organisation’s operations, with director Johnnie Moore telling Sky News: “We just want to feed Gazans. That’s the only thing that we want to do.”

Israel says it has let enough food into Gaza and has accused the UN of failing to distribute it, in what the foreign ministry has labelled as “a deliberate ploy” to defame the country.

‘Humanitarian catastrophe must end’

In a video message posted on X late last night, Sir Keir Starmer condemned the scenes in Gaza as “appalling” and “unrelenting” – and said “the images of starvation and desperation are utterly horrifying”.

The prime minister added: “The denial of aid to children and babies is completely unjustifiable, just as the continued captivity of hostages is completely unjustifiable.

“Hundreds of civilians have been killed while seeking aid – children, killed, whilst collecting water. It is a humanitarian catastrophe, and it must end.”

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Israeli military show aid waiting inside Gaza

Sir Keir confirmed that the British government is now “accelerating efforts” to evacuate children from Gaza who need critical medical assistance, so they can be brought to the UK for specialist treatment.

Israel has now said that foreign countries will be able to airdrop aid into Gaza. While the PM says the UK will now “do everything we can” to get supplies in via this route, he said this decision has come “far too late”.

Read more:
WHO: Gaza faces ‘manmade’ starvation
UN: People in Gaza ‘walking corpses’

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Last year, the RAF dropped aid into Gaza, but humanitarian organisations warned it wasn’t enough and was potentially dangerous. In March 2024, five people were killed when an aid parachute failed and supplies fell on them.

For now, Sir Keir has rejected calls to follow French President Emmanuel Macron and recognise a Palestinian state despite more than 220 MPs signing a cross-party letter to demand he takes this step.

The prime minister is instead demanding a ceasefire and “lasting peace” – and says he will only consider an independent state as part of a negotiated peace deal.

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El Salvador’s Bitcoin reserve fails to help the average citizen — NGO exec

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El Salvador’s Bitcoin reserve fails to help the average citizen — NGO exec

El Salvador’s Bitcoin reserve fails to help the average citizen — NGO exec

Changes to El Salvador’s Bitcoin laws under the IMF agreement put the benefits of BTC even further out of reach for the average resident.

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Real-time crypto laundering exposes CEX vulnerabilities — Report

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Real-time crypto laundering exposes CEX vulnerabilities — Report

Real-time crypto laundering exposes CEX vulnerabilities — Report

New data shows stolen crypto is laundered within minutes, often before hacks are even disclosed.

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