28 May 1999
The NHS is wasting up to £50m a year on private health care for mentally ill patients after closing nearly 10,000 psychiatric beds, health watchdog London Emergency Health has claimed.
In a report for public sector union Unison, the watchdog claimed that the money used to fund private sector care would pay for 1,000 NHS beds in 24-hour nursing accommodation.
The NHS has closed nearly 60% of beds for long-stay psychiatric patients since 1991, yet the numbers admitted have increased by 18%. This 'overspill' of patients now accounts for one in five admitted in the boroughs of Lambeth, Southwark and Lewisham. Many are sent to private hospitals outside the capital.
'Up to £60m a year is being wasted on sub-standard private treatment: but every pound siphoned into the private sector makes it more difficult to improve local, accessible service for Londoners,' said John Lister, author of the report, The Care Gap.
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