NHS Wales can meet outpatient waiting target, minister says

The health minister has not "given up" on NHS Wales reaching its first target for dealing with huge waiting lists.

That would mean no one waiting more than a year for their first outpatient appointment by the end of 2022.

Eluned Morgan said she has had "frank discussions" with health boards which she believed "could still" hit that target.

In July 101,106 patients had been waiting longer than a year, with 60,557 waiting longer than two years.

The minister also told BBC Radio Wales' Sunday Supplement programme NHS Wales' energy bill would be £207m more than initially expected amid rising costs.

She said she would "have to find that money from somewhere" because "there's no way" additional cash from the UK government would cover the extra costs.

And when asked whether she was confident the first NHS waiting target would be met, Ms Morgan MS replied: "I haven't given up yet.

"I think it's really important that the health boards really focus their attention now in the next few months to tackling and trying to reach that target.

"If they were to do what we're asking them to do, which is to treat people in turn, treat people from that cohort, they could still reach that target."

She added: "They're all working their socks off, they are all under huge pressure so I've got no doubt at all that they are working as hard as they can and they are getting through hundreds of thousands every month."

Other targets in the Welsh government's plan to tackle waiting lists, include:

Cardiff University Prof Richard Stanton told BBC Politics Wales programme: "Normally, over the summer we see the backlogs in people waiting for treatment and A&E waiting times, they all come down over the summer, and that puts the NHS in a good place to survive the increase in problems over the winter.

"This year the problems have increased throughout the summer so we're going into the winter in a place where the NHS is really, really under pressure."

Welsh Conservatives' health spokesman, Russell George MS, said while NHS services across the UK would face challenges, the challenge would be greatest in Wales.

"We went into a pandemic in a more difficult position and we're in a more difficult and challenging position now," he said.

"We've got one in five people on a waiting list at the moment for treatment."