By Ruth Mosalski

Copyright walesonline

One of the key NHS pledges that the Welsh Government has made is to reduce waiting times in Wales, and yet the latest figures show that number has gone up. The latest NHS waiting times figures have been released and show the number of patient pathways – which aren’t the same as patients – waiting two years is 8,005 for July 2025, up from 7,447 the month before. Both however are dramatically down on May when it was 10,254. In England, there are 244 patients, according to NHS England, waiting more than 104 weeks for treatment. There are some caveats to be made between directly comparing the two figures between England and Wales, but there is clearly a vast difference between these figures. It comes as doctors warn about staffing levels in the NHS. The number of pathways waiting longer than a year is 156,143, down from 157,027 the month before and the figure of 162,958. Overall, 793,058 patient pathways were waiting for treatment, down slightly from 794,543 in June 2025. A pathway is slightly different to an individual patient, because one patient could be under multiple pathways open. For our free daily briefing on the biggest issues facing the nation, sign up to the Wales Matters newsletter here The government, led by Eluned Morgan, has made the NHS a key priority. In June, health secretary Jeremy Miles had said there were three key targets for the administration. In order: The current waiting list figure is 793,058 and Jeremy Miles has vowed to cut it by 200,000. It was last in the region of 593,000 in April 2021, when the figure was 597,291. At the start of the pandemic, in March 2020, 458,154 people were on waiting lists in Wales. The current number of people waiting two years or more for treatment is 8,005. The last time there was no-one waiting for a two year wait was in October 2011. The number started rising higher than 100 consistently in July 2016. At the start of the pandemic, in March 2020, there were 279 people waiting for two years or more. Two years later, in March 2023, the number was 31,726. The highest it reached was 70,417 in March 2022. In terms of diagnostics, the pledge is to “restore the diagnostic wait times to be reduced to under eight weeks by March 2026”. Currently there are 81,459 people waiting up to eight weeks across all health boards. There are 15,947 pathways waiting between eight and 14 weeks, and 26,268 pathways over 14 weeks. The health board with the highest number of the longest waits is Cardiff and Vale, followed by Betsi Cadwaladr with 10,124 and 9,347 respectively. Powys Teaching Health Board has 75 people waiting. In June this year, the health secretary announced £120m extra which he said would provide more outpatient appointments, more diagnostic tests and more treatments, including more than 20,000 cataract operations. Today (September 18) he has said that money has paid for 15,000 extra outpatient appointments this month. He said: “We are expecting to see fluctuations in the month-on-month statistics. I remain confident we will see a significant reduction in long waits by the end of the second quarter.” The figures today have been, expectantly, criticised by political opponents, but concern has also been raised from within the profession. Professor Jon Barry , Director in Wales at the Royal College of Surgeons of England said: “With such fluctuating figures each month, and with total numbers of those waiting largely unchanged over the last year, it is hard to herald any decrease as a meaningful sign of progress. “Getting waiting times in Wales back on an even keel demands long-term solutions. The Welsh Government must pivot its focus away from short-term targets that aren’t being achieved and towards a long-term approach, with the expansion of surgical hubs at its core. Only then can meaningful, sustained reductions in waiting times be achieved.” The Welsh Government’s chief statistician, Stephanie Howarth, has also said the way data is being presented is changing. In a blog, she writes that some data is currently published with a seven week lag. Provisional data will also be included in some categories going forward. She writes: “These measures will be provisional, and they may change to some extent before the official statistics are published. However, we believe the provisional figures will provide a reliable and timely indication of changes for the month ahead”. However, that has been criticised by opponents, with both the Conservatives and Plaid Cymru saying the focus should be on the actual figures, not estimates. James Evans MS, Conservative health spokesman, said: “The government should be producing the actual stats and not provisional estimates ahead of time, which ahead of a Senedd election could end up making the government look good, which unfortunately is a bit of electioneering”. Mabon ap Gwynfor, Plaid Cymru’s health spokesman, said: “Despite the First Minister pledging to eradicate two year NHS waits by March 2023 – over 8,000 patients are still waiting over two years, and it’s actually increased from last month. “Instead of focusing on delivering better outcomes for patients, the Labour Welsh Government are intent on changing how these figures are estimated in order to make themselves look better come the election in May.” In her blog, the statistician writes: “There’s great interest in referral to treatment (RTT) waiting list figures, particularly around long waiting times. The official measures are published with a lag of around 7 weeks, meaning for example, June’s final figures are released on 21 August. “However, given the attention on these statistics and the Welsh Government’s commitment to reducing the longest waits, there is public value in making data on this topic available earlier. We’ve explored how we can provide figures for the following month in the statistical report based on the latest available data, and from August we’ll include estimates for July for the total number of RTT pathways waiting and those waiting more than one and two years.”