A&Es will treat 'equivalent of half the population each year without reform'

Library image of Prof Sir Stephen Powis. Credit: Toby Melville/PA Wire

By Ella Pickover, PA Media

If care is not moved out of hospitals and closer to people’s homes then the equivalent of around half the population will be visiting A&E every year by 2034, England’s top doctor has warned.

Professor Sir Stephen Powis, NHS England’s national medical director, said that if the NHS is to “avoid a situation of overcrowded A&Es” in a decade’s time then it must “go for broke” in moving care from hospital to the community.