In addition to this, as part of the ‘Your NHS Needs
You’ recruitment drive, 15,266 former professionals in
England have so far come forward to help the NHS tackle
COVID-19 and will start being deployed from this
weekend. This includes 5,117 doctors, 5,605 nurses and
midwives and 3,686 allied health professionals and
pharmacists.
From next week 5,750 final year medics and 17,000 final
year nursing students in England will also be asked to
consider moving into frontline placements, with
appropriate support.
This means in total over 38,000 more people will join
the NHS in the coming weeks, alongside over 560,000
volunteers who have signed up as part of the new NHS
volunteer army helping vulnerable people stay safe and
well at home.
Since 2010, there are over 20,200 more doctors in our
NHS and almost 23,000 more nurses working on our wards.
Responding to NHS workforce statistics today, Health
and Social Care Secretary said:
We are more indebted than ever to the staff of the
NHS. We go into this crisis with the NHS bigger than
ever before, with more than 9,000 nurses compared to
last year alone. I’m so proud that since our rallying
call, 38,000 more people will join or return to the
NHS as health and care workers on the frontline
fighting COVID-19.
Our NHS is facing an unprecedented challenge and I
pay tribute to each and every one of them helping
battle this virus.
The entire country is grateful but we must help them
too. That’s why we are telling everyone to stay at
home, protect the NHS and save lives.
