Responding to NHS Wales’ quarterly report on ‘Time spent in NHS Wales Accident and Emergency (A&E) departments’, published today via StatsWales, Welsh Conservative health spokesman, Darren Millar AM, said:
“Today’s report shows that the Welsh Government’s target for eradicating 12-hour or more waits in major A&E departments has gone out the window.
“Since December, the number of patients spending over 12 hours waiting for treatment has doubled – from 11.8% to 23.5% - which is an alarming rise and will have caused untold stress and pain to the patients left languishing in waiting rooms.
“Meanwhile, the Government’s 95% target for patients spending less than four hours in A&E was not met by any of the health boards in any of the last 15 months, and gives further cause for serious concern.
“Powys Teaching was the only health board to meet the target for patients spending less than four hours in A&E since January, and it does not have a major A&E department!
“Going into the fifth Assembly, this report does not bode well for the NHS or the patients it serves. It comes off the back of a conveyor belt of bad reports and one is left wondering when, if ever, this bleak picture will improve.
“Today’s figures are further evidence that of Labour’s mismanagement of our healthcare system and it is patients and staff who are left paying the price for that failure.”
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