The Waiting List Rises Again as Corridor Care Climbs 13%
An estimated 7.37 million treatments were waiting at the end of August, covering 6.24 million patients — the highest since October 2025 and a second consecutive monthly rise. In September 50,582 people waited more than twelve hours between a decision to admit and being admitted, up from 44,951 in August. That is 1,686 people every day.
The health service is not idle: a record 4.7 million planned treatments, procedures and appointments were delivered across June to August, more than in any previous summer. Demand is simply rising faster. Francesca Cavallaro of the Health Foundation puts the arithmetic plainly — rising referrals mean “the service is having to run faster just to stand still and the prospects of meeting the government’s pledge are receding” — and adds a political question that has not been answered: whether Andy Burnham’s government will give the eighteen-week target the priority it had under Keir Starmer. That target has not been met for a decade; the stated aim is 92% within eighteen weeks by 2029. Accident and emergency performance against the four-hour standard fell to 74.4% in September from 75.0% in August. Professor Frankie Swords, NHS England’s national medical director, says staff are seeing “the ominous early signs of pressure, with more patients coming to A&E with flu and other respiratory viruses than usual for this time of year”. Dr Vicky Price of the Society for Acute Medicine is blunter about the twelve-hour figure: a 13% year-on-year rise as winter approaches “should set alarm bells ringing”.