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| Labour seeks summit to find A&E 'fix' | |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| Labour has called on the government to hold an urgent summit on how to alleviate pressure on A&E services in English hospitals. | |
| Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham said local government, the emergency services and other NHS professionals needed to agree co-ordinated action. | |
| Figures show the NHS has missed its four-hour A&E waiting time target. | Figures show the NHS has missed its four-hour A&E waiting time target. |
| In a letter to Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, Mr Burnham said there had been a "failure" to anticipate the situation. | In a letter to Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, Mr Burnham said there had been a "failure" to anticipate the situation. |
| Mr Burnham suggested the problem was linked to a loss of social care capacity this winter. | |
| "You will know that I have repeatedly warned throughout this Parliament that severe cuts to social care could end up dragging down the NHS," he said. | |
| "This is exactly what is happening now. Increasing numbers of very frail, elderly people are ending up in A&E and then becoming trapped in hospital because the care they need to be discharged is not available. | |
| "This comes on top of pressures arising from the fact that people are finding it harder to see a GP, and pressures within the NHS from the shortage of nurses and GPs." | |
| Major incidents | |
| Mr Hunt earlier admitted that meeting the A&E standard was proving tough, but pointed out that England has some of the toughest targets in the world. | |
| The figures showed that from October to December 92.6% of patients were seen in four hours - below the 95% target. | |
| The performance is the worst quarterly result since the target was introduced at the end of 2004. | |
| The rest of the UK is also missing the target and a number of hospitals have declared "major incidents" recently. | |
| This signifies they are facing exceptional pressures and triggers extra staff being called in and other steps, including cancelling non-emergency care, such as routine operations. |