The NHS needs the equivalent of up to 20 new hospitals to deal with millions of cancelled ops, say consultants.
Medics say they are looking at a backlog of three to six months on top of the worst waiting times since records began.
Dr Rob Harwood, chair of the British Medical Association’s consultants committee, said the health service would need 10,000 new beds if it was to avoid being crippled by pressure from the pandemic.
We revealed last week that 2.1 million cancelled elective operations - such as hip and knee replacements - will cost around £3 billion to reschedule.
Medics also told us thousands could die if cancers are missed, while others are developing lifelong complications from strokes because they’re scared to go to A&E.
Mental health waiting lists are expected to spiral out of control as the suicide rate rockets in the wake of economic devastation.
Dr Harwood said: “We reckon the NHS needs another 10,000 beds to make sure we don’t continually fall behind with capacity.
“You are looking at between 10 and 20 hospital equivalents across the UK. This would bring our bed occupancy in line with European health economies.
“This would mean we wouldn’t have to stop doing elective surgery when it got to winter because our wards were full of people with flu and respiratory infections.
“We will have a backlog of three to six months on top of the worst waiting position the NHS has been in since records existed.”
Dr Harwood also called on the government to extend its arrangements with the private sector for at least three months so medics could begin to tackle a mountain of missed ops.
He added: “I really hope the long term lesson we take away from this is to invest more in the physical resources of the NHS to make sure it can do everything we want it to do.”
