A record number of children’s operations - including emergency surgeries - were cancelled in England last year, it has been revealed.
Research by the Labour Party found that 18,647 surgeries were cancelled in 2017/18, with patients who should have been operated on suffering from conditions ranging from tonsillitis and broken bones to haemorrhages and breast cancer.
Other children were left waiting for terminations, eye surgery and operations to tackle sleep apnoea.
The figure represents a 58% spike in cancellations since 2011/12, when just under 12,000 operations were dropped.
Condemning the numbers as “shameful”, shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said children “deserve better”.
“The cancellation of an operation brings tremendous anguish and uncertainty which must be especially unsettling for children and their families,” he said.
“Behind each of these cancellations is a sick child and their loved ones facing unnecessary distress for entirely avoidable reasons.”
The Leicester South MP added: “The fact that thousands of children’s operations - including for broken bones, removing rotten teeth, eye surgery and even breast cancer - have had to be cancelled on this scale reveals yet again an NHS pushed to the brink by the Tories.”
Data uncovered by the Labour Party through Freedom of Information requests revealed that at least 117,936 children’s operations had been cancelled since the Conservative Party came to power in 2010, with factors including equipment failure, staffing shortages and critical care unavailability to blame.
Meanwhile, Great Ormond Street was found to have the highest number of dropped surgeries, with 7,335 recorded in just 12 months in 2016/17.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “There are 2.1million more operations taking place a year than in 2010, and hospitals continue to do everything they can to keep last minute cancellations to a minimum.
“The NHS long-term plan, together with our historic funding commitment for the health service, will see frontline services improve and put the health service on a long-term sustainable footing, backed by an extra £20 billion a year by 2023/24.”