The work of the Department of Health and Social Care and its organisations touches the lives of an average of 1. 7 million patients per day and costs the taxpayer around 187. 3 billion per year. The health system faces significant financial pressures on numerous fronts, which means that strong financial management and decision - making, and efficiency improvements, are essential for the NHS's long - term sustainability. While the Department has made progress, significant issues remain with its financial management and oversight of its arms - length bodies. We are concerned that it lacks a grip of the financial pressures it faces and therefore lacks adequate plans for key areas of spend and activity. The Department's annual report is late again and contains too little information on areas of interest to Parliament, including plans for social care, plans to move to prevention of ill health, and on how to harness technological advances to improve the NHS's productivity. The Department simply cannot afford poorly devised and poorly overseen infrastructure programmes. One such programme is the modernisation of high containment laboratories. These are critical to the UK's public health infrastructure and a key defence against a future pandemic. We are deeply concerned that there is no long - term plan for ensuring that the UK continues to have this capability since, despite the UK Health Security Agency spending nearly 400 million developing a site at Harlow, this project is now on hold due to expected costs spiralling from 530 million to 3. 2 billion. The UK Health Security Agency has little time...
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The work of the Department of Health and Social Care and its organisations touches the lives of an average of 1. 7 million patients per day and costs the taxpayer around 187. 3 billion per year. The health system faces significant financial...
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