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The UK government should consider using private capital to correct the collapsed buildings and infrastructure of the NHS, said the head of health services in England.
NHS England CEO Amanda Pritchard called for a more “radical” approach with key interventions to serve with the highest maintenance backlog on record.
“We need to think more fundamentally about capital, especially,” Pritchard told the BBC on Thursday. “I think we must now consider private capital investments in the NHS.”
She added that unless the service fixes the building and outdated technology, it will be difficult to achieve long-term improvements.
The comment calls for the government to reverse the ban on the use of private finances and fix what health leaders called services suffering from aging real estate as “broken” capital investment systems.
After hospitals, schools and local governments struggled to deal with large-scale debt repayments, a private financial initiative scheme was dropped for the central government in 2018, and the national audit firm’s report was the one that was reported by taxpayers. I warned that the money was not worth it.
However, while some local governments continue to launch PFI schemes, a small number of public-private partnerships in Wales are being offered under the mutual investment model.
A government commissioned review last year found that England spent £37 billion on health assets and infrastructure between 2010 and 2020 than its peer countries.
This shortage has forced health services to raid capital budgets to manage their daily spending, leaving the highest record maintenance backlog at £13.8 billion, with collapsed buildings and cumulative maintenance backlogs remaining I did.
In a report on Tuesday, the NHS coalition called on the UK government to emulate the Welsh government’s initiative to expand private sector involvement in the development of health infrastructure.
Private investments in health services real estate include PFI, third party development and buyback, mutual investment models, infrastructure and investment partnerships.
The Ministry of Health, Social Care did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
