General practices in deprived areas should get extra “levelling up” funding, says report

The government must inject more funding into general practice in socioeconomically deprived areas as part of its national “levelling up” agenda, a charity that campaigns for a healthier population has argued.1

The briefing paper from the Health Foundation highlights that areas of high deprivation have the greatest health needs, but that general practice is underfunded and underdoctored in these areas.

“The persistence of the inverse care law in general practice is a consequence of policies failing to allocate resource according to need,” said Rebecca Fisher, senior policy fellow at the Health Foundation and author of the report. …