The pressure on NHS budgets is largely due to economic conditions. Looking at funding compared to GDP rather than nominal terms shows this. NHS funding peaked a

The pressure on NHS budgets is largely due to economic conditions. Looking at funding compared to GDP rather than nominal terms shows this. NHS funding peaked at 7.5% of GDP in 2010, but that peak was mainly due to a drop in GDP, not an increase in funding. With tax revenue declining due to recession and an extended period of low growth those funding levels were unsustainable. We're still actually spending about the same percentage of GDP on health care now as we were in 2009. The blue bars in the chart are recessions, when funding relative to GDP jumped mainly due to a drop in GDP, not an increase in funding. https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/news-item/70-years-of-nhs-spending#then-and-now https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/news-item/70-years-of-nhs-s... The historical lesson is yes, if you want big increases in NHS funding elect a Labour government (although by 1997 the Conservatives were already ramping up health care spending), but I'm not convinced the UK economy has much leeway to support spending a lot more than the current 7% of GDP on health care.