Staffordshire CCGs to outsource cancer services as private sector expands in NHS

Cancer care and treatment services across Staffordshire are being put out to tender in what is believed to be the biggest outsourcing deal in NHS history.

Four of Staffordshire’s clinical commissioning groups (Stafford and Surrounds, Cannock Chase, North Staffordshire, and Stoke-on-Trent) have come together to tender contracts for cancer care and end of life services across the county, jointly worth £1.22bn (€1.5bn; $2.1bn). The commissioning groups are working with the charity Macmillan Cancer Support on the initiative.

This week the health policy think tank the Nuffield Trust released a briefing showing how the private sector’s slice of NHS services was growing.1 The analysis, extracted from In the Red, the trust’s comprehensive analysis of the finances of the NHS since 2010 (due to be published on 10 July), shows that spending on independent sector provision of community and mental health services was still rising but that growth in provision of hospital services by the private sector had stalled.

The briefing examined primary care trusts’ spending from 2010-11 to 2012-13. It showed that the proportion of community services provided by …