In response to an Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) report The NHS in 2022, NHS Providers' interim chief executive Saffron Cordery said:

"The IFS is right to highlight the many pressures facing an overstretched NHS in what may be its toughest ever winter.

"Bed occupancy was around 95% at the last count, above the level considered safe. There is no let-up in demand on services hamstrung by severe staff shortages – with more than 133,000 vacancies in trusts across England alone. Trusts face recurring pressures from COVID-19 which will continue to have major financial and operational impacts in future.

"Trust leaders and their staff are working flat out to tackle care backlogs. They have reduced the longest waits for treatment and are exceeding pre-pandemic levels of cancer diagnosis and mental health activity.

"But pressure on social care and community services means that hospitals struggle to discharge people who are well enough to leave, with a serious knock-on effect on admissions and ambulance handovers.

"As the IFS report shows, a number of pressures arising from years of under investment are coming together. A significant lack of capital funding over the past 10 years has prevented trusts from expanding bed capacity in line with our European counterparts, carrying out vital maintenance repairs and improving the quality of the NHS estate.

"Government recently took a welcome step forward in confirming the introduction of a workforce plan for the NHS to train the right staff in the right numbers and support recruitment and retention.  But now we need that plan to be fully funded.

"Finally, government must act to fix chronic staff shortages and an underfunded social care system to help ease pressure right across the health and care system."