• Prime minister Boris Johnson will announce a £200m cash boost for cancer screening equipment in a bid to drive earlier diagnosis and improve survival.
• More than 300 diagnostic machines will be funded across the country, in a bid to replace outdated MRI machines, CT scans and breast screening equipment with “cutting edge” technology.
• The new machines will be “AI-enabled” to keep pace with future advances in technology, which allow tasks now done by humans to be done by computer.

Responding to the government’s announcement on cancer equipment, the director of policy and strategy at NHS Providers, Miriam Deakin, said:

“It’s good to see the government wants to address the severe shortfall in NHS capital spending and we look forward to seeing the detail of any additional funding.

Our campaign #RebuildOurNHS has highlighted the disruption, delay and potential risk for patients when trusts are not able to properly maintain or replace scanners, so any additional support in this area is welcome.

Miriam Deakin    Co-Director of Development and Engagement

“Our campaign #RebuildOurNHS has highlighted the disruption, delay and potential risk for patients when trusts are not able to properly maintain or replace scanners, so any additional support in this area is welcome.

“However the impact of a decade of capital neglect will not be resolved by a succession of piecemeal announcements.

“We need a multiyear capital funding settlement, a commitment to bring NHS capital funding into line with comparable economies and an effective way of ensuring capital funding gets to where it’s needed most.”