Public Health England

Public Health England (PHE) provides national leadership and expert services to support public health, and also works with local government and the NHS to respond to emergencies. PHE:

co-ordinates a national public health service and delivers some elements of this

builds an evidence base to support local public health services

supports the public to make healthier choices

provides leadership to the public health delivery system

supports the development of the public health workforce

In 2014, the Commonwealth Fund declared that in comparison with the healthcare systems of 10 other countries (Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the US) the NHS was the most impressive overall. The NHS was rated as the best system in terms of efficiency, effective care, safe care, co-ordinated care, patient-centred care and cost-related problems. It was also ranked second for equity.

The NHS employs more than 1.6 million people.

The NHS in England is the biggest part of the system by far, catering to a population of 53.9 million and employing more than 1.3 million people. Of those, the clinically qualified staff include 40,236 general practitioners (GPs), 351,446 nurses, 18,576 ambulance staff, and 111,963 hospital and community health service (HCHS) medical and dental staff.

The NHS in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland employs 159,748; 84,817 and 62,603 people respectively.

Funding

Funding for the NHS comes directly from taxation. Since the NHS transformation in 2013 the NHS payment system has become underpinned by legislation. The Health & Social Care Act 2012 moves responsibility for pricing from the Department of Health, to a shared responsibility for NHS England and Monitor. When the NHS was launched in 1948, it had a budget of £437 million (roughly £9 billion at today’s value). For 2015/16, it was around £115.4 billion.

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 1150