Hospital cuts 'put cancer care at risk'

The annual plans submitted by Monitor revealed that a quarter of the country’s 129 foundation trusts (FTs) fear that hospital cuts will cause them to miss waiting time targets for treating cancer and the control of superbugs.

More than 20 trusts said they may not be able to meet performance standards such as the maximum 62 days between GP referral and treatment for cancer.

Eleven of the FTs admitted fears that they would be unable to adequately control superbugs such as MRSA and C.difficile, while a further three mental health trusts voiced concerns about meeting care targets.

Monitor showed there would be a drop in trusts’ income for the first time of between 0.8 and 1.1 per cent by 2012-13.

It also said unprecedented "cost improvement plans" would be required of trusts, which would need to make massive savings of 4.4 per cent this year compared to last year’s 3 per cent.

Campaigners are expecting that care will be rationed and some operations could be ruled out altogether as a result of the financial strain.

Campaign group Health Emergency chairman Geoff Martin said: "These shocking figures, coming before massive cuts across the NHS that we are expecting this autumn, nail the lie that the health service is somehow immune from the Con-Dem public services spending assault.

"We can expect what is happening with cancer services to be replicated across the whole range of treatments and procedures as we head back to the bad old days of waiting lists and trolley queues in A&E.

"Nobody should underestimate the scale of the crisis that’s brewing up in the NHS as we head towards the busy winter period."

Monitor chief executive Steve Bundredsaid the annual plans reflected trusts’ “welcome dose of realism about the prospects they face."