NHS needs to prepare for end of “unprecedented” funding increases

The NHS must act fast to shore up its resources against a planned shortfall in funding after 2011, the healthcare think tank the King’s Fund has warned.

Its report, How Cold Will it Be?, says that boosting productivity in the NHS now would enable it to make major financial gains that would offset the effects of an end to funding increases in the future. It predicts that the NHS will need to make gains of between £23.5bn (€27.3bn; $38.8bn) and £48.9bn between 2011-2 and 2016-7 (£3.9bn to £8.2bn each year).

Published by the King’s Fund and the Institute of Fiscal Studies, …