For those of you who follow me for health reporting, bear with me as I have a thread that's not on my usual topics. My daughter goes to King Edward VII School (KES) in Sheffield. It's an historic school, the last local authority secondary in the city and a true comprehensive. It's a large school on two sites, diverse catchment. Academically it does well particularly at A level. But its ethos is all achievement is celebrated, it has a broad curriculum and a wide range of extra curricular activities and trips. It has no uniform.

The NHS is under massive pressure, ambulance demand up 25%, waiting lists at all time high. GPs are working 13h days to try and manage workload seeing way more (often v complex) patients than is safe. Every single practice I speak to say demand is through the roof. The issue of f2f appointments is tied up with this because with demand hugely outweighing capacity they have to decide the best way to meet patient needs - it’s called triage. Many patients prefer this (my GP was doing phone triage pre covid) but it’s also necessary.