The health policy year in twelve charts 2025

Siva Anandaciva and Danielle Jefferies look back on the health and care trends, key figures, news stories and policy changes that happened in 2025.

January

As if winter in the NHS wasn’t hard enough already, January saw the word ‘quademic’ increasingly enter the lexicon, as high levels of flu, norovirus, Covid-19 and RSV circulated. The start of the year also brought further delays to the Government’s national plan to build or refurb NHS hospitals – with all the costs to patients and staff that entails (Figure 1).

But it wasn’t all doom and gloom. The government started the year by (finally) announcing more details about the Casey Commission into the future of adult social care – even if, unlike the previous rapid Darzi review, the commission would be asked to take three years rather than three months to report.

February

February saw the government hit its target to deliver 2 million more NHS appointments seven months ahead of schedule – though because of the vast amount of activity the NHS already delivers, it was unsurprising that words like ‘modest’ and ‘unambitious’ were used to describe the feat. And our work on dysfunctional NHS admin showed that there were other areas where more ambition was needed – with nearly 2 in 3 patients and carers experiencing at least one problem like lost test results or being unable to change appointments in the past year.

The month ended with the unexpected resignation of Amanda Pritchard as CEO of NHS England – which was the start of one of the most significant restructures of national bodies (and the people who lead them) in a decade (Figure 2).

Note: if viewing on mobile, you can view this table as a PDF here.

March

Few people knew what March would bring. Initial reports of significant staffing reductions in NHS England and ICBs rapidly escalated to the bombshell announcement that NHS England would be abolished and integrated into the DHSC. ICBs would also be asked to make swingeing cuts to staffing and programme budgets, which would lead to a set of mergers that are still continuing as the year ends. A government that initially said it would avoid restructures of the NHS had instead embarked on a restructure that would later be compared to High Speed 2 (never a good thing…) and described as ‘rushed and chaotic’.

In other news this month, the latest NHS staff survey showed too many staff feel undervalued and overstretched; ahead of the Tobacco and Vapes Bill becoming law, smoking rates in part of England rose for the first in nearly 20 years; planned walkouts from pharmacists (termed ‘pharmaggedon’ by some) were called off after a new funding deal; and our interviews with finance directors showed just how much pressure still remained on NHS balance sheets (Figure 3).

April

April brought more government announcements – including increases in GP recruitment and a call for evidence for the national Men’s Health Strategy. Spring also brought the annual results from our joint poll of public attitudes to the NHS and adult social care, which saw public satisfaction with the NHS plunge to a 40-year low. In response to the data, the new CEO of NHS England used part of his first public interview to warn of a ‘growing disconnect between the service and the population’.

May

There were mixed reactions to this month’s announcement that new specialist mental health crisis centres would be trialled in England – there was hope these would help tackle incredibly long waits some patients with mental health conditions experience in A&E but also concern that separating care might mean some physical health needs are missed.

This month’s local elections saw massive swings in power across the country, with some new councillors quickly coming to face with the challenges facing the adult social care sector (Figure 5). And there was news this month that England would become the first country in the world to start vaccinating people against gonorrhoea, as infections continued to soar.

June

This month, after an emotional debate, MPs voted in favour of assisted dying legislation. June also saw the government announce the results of its Comprehensive Spending Review in June – the TLDR summary is ‘more funding for health and care, but hardly a bonanza’. The government also announced (after media reports had already started circulating) that Healthwatch England and the local Healthwatch network would be abolished. And the NHS called for more blood donors to cover a shortfall in donations (Figure 6).

July

After months of waiting, July saw the publication of the 10 Year Health Plan. The plan would confirm the government’s ambition for a more preventative-focussed, digitally-enabled and community-based service. The plan included proposals for everything from more neighbourhood health centres to more genomic screening (Figure 7). But there was much debate over the ‘missing’ delivery chapter, which made the document feel more like a 10 year vision than concrete plan for reform.  

This month also saw some positive results in the GP patient survey (with three quarters of patients reporting their overall experience of their practice was good); and the rancorous debates over physician associates continued with proposals to rename the roles.  

August

This month, only ten years after the Cumberlege review of maternity care, Baroness Amos was asked to lead a further urgent review of longstanding issues in NHS maternity services. August also brought worrying data of uneven (and in some cases stalling) progress in survival from different types of cancer. And it was also announced that, for the first time, free chickenpox vaccinations would be offered to eligible kids in England from 2026.

Note: if viewing on mobile, you can see a version of the chart as a PDF here.

September

September saw the government publish new league tables of NHS performance. The commitment to transparency was commendable, but the league tables created more heat than light when it came to understanding how different parts of the NHS were performing. The need for transparency was also seen in the roll-out of Martha’s Rule to all acute hospitals and Jess’s Rule to GPs – both of which were a plea for patient and carer’s concerns to be considered more seriously to prevent avoidable harm. And Wes Streeting led a rebuttal of claims from the US President about the impact of Tylenol.

But one area where transparency was sorely lacking was around the apparent axing of the Government’s Mission Delivery Unit this month – what was once a key government priority to coordinate efforts to improve the nation’s health was relegated without either clarity or fanfare, as the NHS focussed instead on its latest structural reorganisation (Figure 9).

October

Earlier this year, the government decided to row back on its plans to build new hospitals, but October saw plans for at least one new hospital – from 2027, ‘NHS Online’ would be a new digital hospital to connect patients to clinicians anywhere in England.

This month also saw the publication of the medium-term NHS planning guidance, which – despite the government’s repeated emphasis on the 18-week hospital waiting list target - would commit the NHS to achieving nearly all its waiting time standards by the end of the parliament.

And as the government announced plans to tackle antisemitism and other racism in the NHS, there was a rise in racist incidents against nurses and reports of sharp rise in NHS graduate scheme applications from ethnic minority people – even if this didn’t necessarily result in a higher share of people from these groups getting on the scheme (Figure 10).

November

This month’s Autumn Budget saw the government announce a ‘milkshake tax’, which would include some sugary milk-based drinks in the soft drink industrial levy. The Budget also lifted the two -child benefit cap and announced the use of private financing to help build some of the new neighbourhood health centres envisioned in the 10 Year Health Plan. And as the government continued its work to update the NHS long-term workforce plan, data from the NMC showed a sharp drop in international recruitment even ahead of further changes to immigration rules which will impact health and social care staff.

December

The year ended with the NHS facing an unusually early flu season (Figure 12), which together with a further wave of industrial action from resident doctors, led Wes Streeting to say he can’t guarantee patient safety. This month also brought a new government review into rising demand for mental health, ADHD and autism services and the publication of the government’s child poverty strategy. But even with winter bring the immediate pressures in the NHS into sharp focus, some of the most shocking news this month was about oral health and levels of tooth decay returning to levels last seen in the late 1990s.

Conclusion

The start of a year is sometimes filled with hopes. And the end of a year is sometimes filled with regrets. There were definitely some bright points in the year – from a child poverty strategy to advances in vaccine treatments. But overall, the year was more of an annus horribilis than mirabilis.

2025 could have been a year of progress in tackling waiting lists, in having a renewed direction for the health and care service, a year of tackling the wider determinants of health through a Health Mission approach. Instead it brought waves of industrial action; social care reform on the backburner; a national and local restructure of the NHS that few people would have called for; a dismantling of the Health Mission approach; and a 10-Year Health Plan that set out a vision for the future but without a delivery roadmap to get there.

So, get thee behind me perhaps when it comes to 2025, and let’s hope 2026 is a better year.