Cuts loom just as increased funding is proven beneficial

Thursday, 3 September 2009 12:01 AM

By politics.co.uk staff

Equity in the NHS did improve after recent reforms, a report out today claimed - but critics fear this may be reversed by looming cuts in the health service.

Research by the London School of Economics has revealed that in the past ten years, an increase in doctors and funding, coupled with market based reforms has led to a drop in waiting times across the board.

The report says that while in 1997 those from more deprived areas waited longer for treatment than those from more affluent areas, by 2007 this phenomenon had disappeared.

The findings show that NHS reforms did not lead to a less equitable distribution of waiting times as many had feared at the time.

However, another confidential report by consultants McKinsey and company to the Department of Health, recommended a ten per cent cut in NHS staffing.

Liberal Democrat health spokesman Norman Lamb said: "If we are to make the NHS more efficient, we need to listen to the people who really understand it, not management consultants whose dreadful record of failure is matched only by their over-inflated bills."

The LSE study has been published in full on

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