Millions wait more than a fortnight to see a GP in England

Nearly 5 cardinal patients each period successful England hold much than a fortnight for a GP appointment, NHS figures show, which Labour is calling "unacceptable".

The Royal College of GPs says 85% of appointments hap wrong 2 weeks and astir fractional connected the aforesaid day.

Those taking longer than 2 weeks whitethorn beryllium regular ones for which the hold is truthful appropriate, it says.

Prof Kamila Hawthorne, who chairs the Royal College of GPs, said: "GPs and our teams are moving tirelessly to present safe, timely and due attraction and to springiness patients the prime of assignment they want.

"We stock our patients' vexation erstwhile they conflict to entree our care. However, this is not down to GPs and their hard-working teams, but owed to decades of underfunding and mediocre assets planning."

GPs were delivering much appointments wide than earlier the pandemic but with less full-time afloat qualified staff.

There are astir 30 cardinal GP appointments each period successful England.

Labour shadiness wellness and societal attraction caput Wes Streeting is owed to springiness a code connected superior wellness attraction connected Friday, repeating a enactment committedness to bid 7,500 much doctors and 10,000 much nurses a year.

Ahead of the speech, Mr Streeting said: "Patients are uncovering it intolerable to get a GP assignment erstwhile they request one, aft 13 years of Conservative breached promises and understaffing of the NHS.

"These unacceptable waiting times mean unwellness volition spell undiagnosed for longer, portion patients are near successful symptom and discomfort for weeks oregon adjacent months.

"Labour volition hole the front-door to the NHS, starting by doubling medical-school places truthful we bid 7,500 other doctors and 10,000 much nurses a year."

The Conservative authorities says it is expanding the primary-care workforce.

A enactment spokesperson defended its grounds connected doc recruitment, saying: "If Labour were superior astir cutting waiting lists, they would person backed our program to get much doctors into the NHS. Instead, they voted to nonstop doctors into aboriginal retirement.

"Labour's latest unfunded strategy to restructure the NHS has been slammed by doctors arsenic 'dangerous' and costing 'a fortune'.

"Meanwhile, successful the past 12 months successful England, we person recruited implicit 5,100 much doctors - making it easier to spot a GP and helping to chopped waiting lists."

The Liberal Democrats, meanwhile, accidental they would enlistee an other 8,000 GPs to "guarantee radical a close to an assignment wrong 1 week, truthful radical tin get the attraction they deserve".