The NHS needs more than a sticking plaster this winter - The Yorkshire Post says

Thérèse Coffey revealed a £500m fund to help get patients out of hospital with many currently unable to be discharged due to inadequate community care.

This is simply a sticking plaster as the care sector continues to struggle with staff shortages. There are around 165,000 vacancies in social care and the sector has been pleading for help for what feels like an eternity.

She also promised to improve access to GPs stating that patients shouldn’t have to wait for more than two weeks for a routine appointment.

But as the Conservative former health secretary Jeremy Hunt said: “It is not more targets the NHS needs, it is more doctors.”

The NHS is sacrosanct. And despite heading into the pandemic woefully unprepared, it mobilised and provided hope during some of the darkest times this country has recently seen.

To send it into another crisis under-equipped would be unforgivable. At a time when people are having to choose between heating and eating, for despite the support from the Government many households will still be paying more in energy bills than before and inflation is still rampant, the NHS could come under extreme pressure.

It’s also easy to forget that Covid has still not gone away and could further strain resources.

The Government cannot be naive enough to think that a sticking plaster is sufficient to deal with numerous challenges ahead for the NHS this winter.