Given the descriptions of how certain European countries have had better experience with managing A&E waiting times than the UK, it is odd that the accompanying chart showed that the UK suffered from too few beds (“Europe offers NHS remedies for winter strain”, Report, April 1).
What is needed is not investment in beds but in business processes. These were what seemed to have helped the hospitals of Denmark, Sweden, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands. They managed to respond, and to move staff around.
It is not IT versus conventional capital that matters. It is having competent managers and flexible systems that count.
Bernard H Casey
Social Economic Research
London and Frankfurt
