article_snippet: NHS hospitals are becoming ‘dangerously’ overcrowded and staff do not have enough time to clean-up between patients, experts warn.
article_snippet: NHS hospitals are becoming ‘dangerously’ overcrowded and targets for waiting times are slipping, experts warn .
article_snippet: the health service experts are particularly concerned that many hospitals are becoming so overcrowded many hospitals wards are unsafe.
article_snippet: Figures show that the average NHS hospital is 90 per cent full but in the last three months to December almost a fifth were more than 95 per cent occupied.
article_snippet: This is partly because many hospitals have lost beds and closed wards as part of a long-term drive to treat more patients at home.
article_snippet: But over that time, the numbers of frail patients being admitted to hospital from A&E has increased and the numbers of frail patients being admitted to hospital from A&E are being packed onto crowded wards where there is a high turnover.
article_snippet: There is clearly pressure in the system to use beds more intensively as the money is tighter, but patients keep turning up at the front door.
article_snippet: ‘The pressure is building and bubbling out in terms of bed occupancy levels which are getting dangerously high.
highlights_snippet: A new report has said hospitals are becoming ‘dangerously’ overcrowded .
  