Image source, PA

The first target to tackle the NHS backlog after the Covid pandemic has been missed.

Almost 75,000 people are waiting a year or more for an outpatient appointment when there should be none.

The Welsh government said it was "disappointed that this ambitious target... has not been met".

However, ambulance response times, handover delays and A&E waiting times have improved from record lows seen in the previous month.

The number of people waiting for hospital treatment has also fallen for the third successive month.

The post-Covid target, set by the Welsh government, was to see no-one waiting more than a year for a first appointment by the end of 2022, but that figure stood at 74,976.

Nearly 42,000 people waiting a year on more were in three specialisms: Ophthalmology, ear nose and throat, and trauma and orthopaedics.

The Welsh government said it would continue to press health boards to focus on the longest waiters, once urgent cases had been dealt with.

Conservative health spokesman Russell George said to miss the target "by tens of thousands is an undeniable failure".

There was an improvement in ambulance response times, with 48.9% of immediately life-threatening "red" calls arriving within eight minutes in January, but still worse than 12 months earlier and below the 65% target.

There were 23,035 "lost" hours by ambulances spending time outside major A&E units, unable to drop off patients beyond the 15 minute target - the lowest figure for six months.

There was also a fall in the number of patients stuck in hospital despite being well enough to be discharged, down about 10% compared to the previous month, but there were still about 1,000 patients waiting for a care package or support to be arranged.

These latest figures cover the period of industrial action by nurses in December 2022 and ambulance staff in January of this year.

It provides an important context when we see that daily 999 calls during January fell by nearly a quarter.

Attendances at A&E also fell on the previous month.

Waiting lists for hospital treatment fell by 1.75% to a total of 735,139 patient pathways but this is still the sixth-highest number on record.

With some patients on more than one waiting list, it is estimated there were 577,400 individuals waiting - down 8,500 on the month.

Numbers waiting a year or more - just under 162,000 - fell for a fourth month in a row while those waiting two years or more - 6.2% of the waiting list - also dropped.

There are still 22% of those on the waiting list waiting more than a year in Wales, compared to less than 6% in England, where almost no-one is waiting more than two years.

A&E waiting times also showed an improvement on a record low in the previous month, with 69.9% of people were seen within the four-hour target in January.

Meanwhile, 8,999 people spent 12 hours or more in A&E before being seen - no-one should wait that long under current targets - although this was the lowest in more than a year.

The median waiting time of two hours and 35 minutes was the shortest since April 2021.

However, cancer performance figures have deteriorated.

Fewer people started their first treatment in December than the previous month and the number given the all-clear also fell.

Performance against the 62-day targets also fell to the second lowest on record - 52.9%.

The Welsh government said: "December was one of the toughest months in the history of the NHS, with high Covid and flu rates, huge demand caused by concerns over Strep A and industrial action impacting on activity.

"Despite the pressures, progress continues to be made across planned and emergency care in the NHS in Wales."

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