NHS 'removing patients from waiting lists' as Labour battles to clear the backlog

More than a quarter of a million patients were taken off NHS lists in January, up nearly 15 per cent from the previous month.

NHS figures show that the waiting list for treatment continues to fall.

The list in England has fallen for the third month in a row, with an estimated 7.25 million treatments waiting to be carried out at the end of January, relating to 6.13 million patients.

This is down from 7.29 million treatments and 6.17 million patients at the end of December and is the lowest level since February 2023, when it stood at 7.22 million.The list hit a record high in September 2023, with 7.77 million treatments and 6.50 million patients.

The total backlog dropped by nearly 44,000 to 7.25 million in a single month.

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Healthwatch England said that the proportion of people paying for healthcare privately had “increased significantly” over the last two years as it warned over a “two-tier” health system, where those who can afford to do not have to wait for care.

Other removals include those who died because of a lack of treatment, and people who failed to respond to text messages. 

Hospitals receive £33 for every patient taken off backlogs in this way.

Sarah Scobie, the deputy director of research at the Nuffield Trust think tank, told The Telegraph: “The sporadic improvements we see are not all about the NHS delivering more care.

“There was another uptick in ‘unreported removals’ from the waiting list in January, which includes tidying up the data as much as possible by removing patients who don’t need to be on there any more.”

Health chiefs say that patients are only wiped off their lists if they no longer require the procedure they are waiting for. 

Meanwhile, NHS England says it would be “completely misleading” to claim that removing patients from lists was the reason backlogs have dropped. 

“The reason waiting lists have fallen is because the NHS delivered record numbers of appointments, tests and scans in 2025. That’s how we have cut waiting lists to their lowest level in three years, and year-long waits to their lowest level in almost six,” a spokesperson said.

They added: “The number of patients removed from the waiting list has been stable over the past three years and is substantially lower now than before the pandemic, down from 17 per cent of total removals in 2019 to 14 per cent last year.

“Whether a patient is removed due to a specific treatment starting or other reasons, they still get the care they need – from getting the all-clear following a scan, receiving specialist clinical advice or ongoing medical monitoring of their condition.”

The waiting list hit a record high in September 2023, with 7.77 million treatments and 6.50 million patients.

When Labour entered government in 2024, it vowed to slash waiting times with 40,000 more appointments every week. 

Sir Keir Starmer vowed to restore standards to the previous high of 92 per cent of patients treated within 18 weeks by the end of the parliamentary term.