Ireland and UK top explosive waiting lists
Waiting lists for public and private healthcare treatment have exploded during the COVID-19 pandemic as hospitals and patients deferred treatment. How does the peak in waiting lists compare between countries?
The infographic below compares publicly available data on the peak in waiting lists for hospital treatments or consultations in England, Ireland, Spain, Portugal and Australia, controlled for the size of the population. It confirms anecdotal evidence that the situation is the worst in Ireland, followed by England.
Methodology may differ slightly between sources rendering comparisons difficult, but broadly these figures show the number of people waiting for hospital/secondary treatment to start after a referral from a general practitioner. The Australian figure includes private and public hospitals, while the NHS England data is public-only.
The figure is surprisingly hard to obtain in most countries, even those where capacity is generally higher (Germany and France) where you’d expect waiting lists to be relatively lower.
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