Good Morning Britain ‘s Dr Hilary Jones appeared on the ITV breakfast show this morning to speak on the NHS update amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The NHS is encouraging sick patients to visit hospitals and GP surgeries during the second wave after thousands were turned away during lockdown.
The doctor ranted that it is “important” that the NHS continue to see non-Covid patients to avoid even more of a backlog.
Dr Hilary said: “Routine NHS work has to continue.
“There is something like 110,000 people now waiting for more than a year already for things like cataract operations and hip and knee surgeries.”
Dr Hilary told the sick to ‘get over’ fears and see their GP
“People are in a lot of pain and what we know from surveys is about half of people are saying they’re going to delay talking to their doctor about these problems that they have.”
“Twenty-two per cent are worried about being exposed to Covid at the surgery.
“Some people are saying they don’t want to be a burden and we’ve got to get over that. We’ve got to get people to call their GP surgery saying I’ve got symptoms, I am in pain, ‘please can you see me?’.
Hilary ordered the sick to start chasing their appointments
“We need those referrals to be followed up so that we’ve got Covid secure areas in hospitals geared up to see people routinely.
“And people in pain, people with cancer, we know that cancer patients have had to wait much longer than they would after urgent referral even.
“The two week period in which they are due to be seen, only 87 per cent are being seen in that time frame if they’ve got urgent symptoms of cancer that need to be followed up and diagnosed.
“So, this is a problem but the backlog is building and we have to address this just at the same as we would Covid-19 patients we have to treat patients with ordinary other problems.”
Viewers rushed to Twitter to share their thoughts.
One wrote: “My gp surgery won’t see anyone it’s all phone consultations, that’s if your lucky enough to get past the receptionists.”
A second tweeted: “My local GP doesn’t want to see anyone with minor issues, They’re only interested if it’s something that could need hospital investigation and then it’s only telephone consultations.”
“But sick patients won’t go into hospital they’ve more fear coming away with something worse than them walked in with,” said another.
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
