Overwhelmed hospitals in parts of the UK will face several weeks of growing pressure before the effects of this week’s new national lockdown are felt, a senior doctor has warned.

Many hospitals are already busier than in the first wave, NHS England said, while doctors’ leaders called for assurances that NHS would be protected as pressures increase. In Liverpool, Lancashire and Nottinghamshire, the NHS is now treating more COVID-19 patients than in the first wave, according to NHS England medical director Professor Stephen Powis. The Health Service Journal said several hospitals in Yorkshire are in the same position – with COVID-19 patients occupying nearly a quarter of beds in Doncaster. A Nightingale hospital in Manchester is due to take its first patients this week. According to the latest data, more than 10,000 patients were in hospital across the UK with the virus on Thursday. In England, the number increased by at least 400 over the weekend.

Professor Powis said: “It takes around a fortnight for today’s infections in the community to result in hospital COVID admissions – so what happens over the next two weeks is partly baked in. But the measures announced today will help reduce the number of admissions beyond that, preventing more people contracting this debilitating and sometimes fatal disease for which there is currently no cure or vaccine. The NHS has learned a lot since the start of the pandemic and has used the summer to prepare further while also restarting services that were disrupted by the first COVID wave.”

The Doctors’ Association called for urgent measures to support staff and other key workers, including new offers of accommodation for those who cannot return home and new access to priority slots in supermarkets.

President Dr Samantha Batt-Rawden said: “The impact of lockdown on our society, especially in our most deprived areas must not be underestimated as witnessed first-hand by our GP colleagues. However, this must be balanced with the need to protect our health service and indeed our patients. Doctors have been telling us that some intensive care units are already struggling, with staff working around the clock to keep patients safe.
This situation without increased measures to safeguard our NHS is simply untenable.”

A statement from the British Medical Association said: “We know this will be painful for the public, but the alternative of a health service with over full hospitals unable to treat seriously ill patients would have been devastating. What is vital now is a clear exit strategy. We cannot afford to have a repeat of the first lockdown which was followed by a rebound surge in infection, impacts on the nation’s mental health, where the economy is made even more fragile and where the NHS and its workers teeter on the verge of collapse because of delays, confusing rules and guidance that doesn’t work.
This lockdown period must also be used ensure we develop a fit for purpose test and trace programme with the capacity and responsiveness to promptly isolate those with infection to contain spread.”

Sir Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, said: “While we knew that the virus would come back in a second wave, actually seeing it happen is the last thing anyone wanted. My experience from other virus outbreaks is that the second wave is always harder. Everyone is worn out, healthcare workers in particular. It can feel more hopeless the second time round. We wish it would just go away. But we have to remember it isn’t hopeless and what we do will make a difference.”

He added: “The only way to get things back to normal quickly is to get the virus under control as soon as possible. The measures being reported today, if implemented and respected, will reduce transmission, get R below one and reset us to an earlier stage of the pandemic. This buys us time before we start to see treatments and vaccines in early 2021. We have to use this time well. The test, trace and isolate system remains critically important and needs all our support. We need enhanced capacity in the NHS, to protect vulnerable people, particularly healthcare workers and those in care homes, and continue to push on urgently to develop safe and effective treatments and vaccines.”

Danny Mortimer, of the NHS Confederation, said: “The NHS is not, and has never been, a COVID-only service, so while the infection is spreading, our members are telling us they want to minimise disruption to their non-urgent activity. However, to continue services, they need the public to play their part in following the necessary infection control measures, including in primary and community care, where clinicians continue to provide face-to-face appointments.”