Hospitals in the United Kingdom

Hospitals in the United Kingdom are mostly now run by the National Health Service, but there are still a number of private hospitals, mostly in or near London.

Before the NHS started in 1947 there were a very large number of small hospitals. It took over 1143 voluntary hospitals, with about 90,000 beds and 1545 municipal hospitals with about 390,000 beds. The average number of people in hospital beds went down from about 410,00 in 1960 to 341,000 in 1974, though the number of people treated went up.

Voluntary hospitals started in the the eighteenth century in England. They gave free medical care to poor people. Their doctors were not paid for this. They made their money from private patients, who were mostly treated in their own homes. They were teaching hospitals and run as charities.

Municipal hospitals were run by local government. They had taken over the workhouses after 1929. They were mostly for people with long term or infectious illnesses, mental illness and mental handicap. Hospitals for people with smallpox or tuberculosis were built in isolated places.

The people who worked in the hospitals under the NHS were paid by the rules of the Whitley councils.

Many of the small hospitals were closed by Nye Bevan in the first years of the NHS. In 1962 Enoch Powell launched the Hospital Plan which had plans for 90 new hospitals, 134 to be rebuilt and about 1000 more small hospitals to be closed. Not all of these were built. The new ones were called District General Hospitals, and they provided most services in the same building. The idea was to make sure there were enough beds in all parts of the country.