NHS waits pressure Brits to economize for personal healthcare – how a lot to finances

Most people expect to put money aside to pay for private healthcare such as dentistry, hip replacements and counselling because of dire NHS waits, damning research shows.

Working-age adults are forced to budget £200 per year in case of private health costs, research shows. High waiting NHS times have led to a record number of people to spend thousands of pounds on procedures like hip replacements and having cataracts removed.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation, who funded the research, found that people thought it was a necessity to have money saved in case they needed private healthcare. A man in Norwich told the charity’s focus group: “Whether it is mental or physical, you need to be able to have the choice to not go with the NHS and see yourself on a waiting list for years and years. You want to just be able to get the help that you need as soon as possible. So you need the little budget to put towards that.”

An annual budget of £200 for private health treatments has for the first time been included in Loughborough University’s annual Minimum Income Standard (MIS) for working-age adults. MIS is calculated by adding up the cost of a basket of goods and services that the public agree are needed to take part in society.

Research shows that Britain’s benefits system fails to ensure households reach the MIS, with many unable to afford everyday life. A single adult who receives out-of-work benefits is £218 short of reaching the MIS. Even those paid the National Living Wage are only achieving MIS if they’re in a couple, without kids and working full-time, the study shows.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting said: “This is the two-tier healthcare system left to us by the Tories. We cannot have a country where the NHS is reduced to a poor service for poor people, while everyone else goes private. They broke the NHS. It’ll take time, but Labour will fix it so that it’s there for everyone.”

David Rowland, director of the Centre for Health and the Public Interest, a think tank that looks at NHS privatisation, told the Observer: “The fact that households are budgeting for healthcare costs is yet another example of how the UK risks drifting towards a two-tier healthcare system where the costs of healthcare are being pushed back on to individuals and their families.”

Peter Matejic, Chief Analyst at JRF, said: “In previous years it would have been unthinkable that cash to pay for health treatments would be necessary for a minimum standard of living. But, this research shows that the public feel they can no longer count on the NHS to provide a universal service that’s free at the point of delivery because some NHS services are now so difficult to access.”

He continued: “The reality is that many families don’t have enough to reach this minimum standard of living, including those on out-of-work benefits and many on the National Living Wage. They can’t set the money aside that the public think is necessary to avoid long waiting lists, and a health problem adds an extra financial insecurity to their lives.”

Weekly Minimum Income Standard budget