NHS trusts are increasingly struggling to address serious maintenance concerns with their estate, new figures from NHS Digital show.
The level of investment needed for NHS building repairs, used as a measure of the buildings’ quality, increased in the most high-risk areas between 2014-15 and 2015-16.
The cost of the high-risk backlog increased by 69.3% from £458m to £776m, while the significant risk backlog increased by 47.6% from £1.06bn to £1.57bn.
However, there were decreases in the cost of the moderate and low-risk backlogs, from £1.55bn to £1.52bn and from £1.27bn to £1.11bn.
Major safety concerns were recently raised about University Hospital, Coventry, after it emerged that it was built without proper fire safeguards.
Despite the increasing risks, the figures also show that less money is being spent on the NHS estate as the NHS as a whole struggles to tackle its deficit.
Full story from the NHE 12 October 2016