The UK’s healthcare systems came close to collapse during the Covid-19 pandemic and were saved only by the “almost superhuman” efforts of frontline staff, according to the third report of the UK Covid-19 Inquiry published last week. Trade bodies across the health and care sector are demanding urgent government action on its findings.

Baroness Hallett’s report, presented to Parliament on 19 March, concluded that the UK entered the pandemic “ill-prepared and with its healthcare systems in a parlous state,” citing severe workforce shortages, an ageing hospital estate, insufficient bed numbers and high occupancy rates. Healthcare systems “teetered on the brink of collapse,” the report found, surviving only due to the dedication of those working within them.

The verdict has drawn a sharp response from the not-for-profit care sector, with the National Care Forum (NCF) arguing the inquiry’s framing understates the true scale of failure.

“The NHS only ‘coped’ by shutting out the vast cohorts of people who were receiving care and support – that is not coping, that is prioritising the care of some over others,” said NCF chief executive Vic Rayner. “Older and disabled people across a range of different types of care and support were simply not able to access the routine and emergency healthcare they needed.”

Rayner pointed to a litany of problems reported by NCF members during the …