A healthy future
Russell Group universities can deliver the skilled staff and new treatments the NHS needs to get waiting lists down and save lives.
The Covid-19 pandemic showed how universities can work with the NHS, businesses, and other partners to respond quickly to new health threats - delivering vaccines and treatments that saved lives and protecting the economy by allowing the UK to come out of lockdown safely.
There is nothing more important than protecting the health of individuals, families and communities, and our universities are developing the solutions and skills to tackle health inequality so everyone can have a healthier future.
Russell Group universities train 4 out of 5 new UK doctors and dentists.
Our research
Our research is improving the quality of life for individuals and brings significant economic benefits too – seen in the vibrant health and life science clusters around many of our universities – but we want to do more.
We should aspire to be the country of choice for clinical trials, open up digital health records, and build on pioneering work in genetics, AI-driven diagnostics, and advanced robotics to transform patient services with earlier diagnosis and better treatments.
We also need to support NHS teams to embed research as a core part of their business.
Setting an ambition for our NHS to become the world’s leading health and life sciences research platform would support investment through life science clusters and drive a productive and healthy nation.
To build a bright future, the next government should:
- Create a new medical training taskforce to oversee workforce planning and help give the NHS the skilled staff it needs.
- Introduce a healthcare education guarantee locking in funding increases for medical training in line with inflation to help universities train more NHS professionals in the UK.
- Work with universities to make the NHS the world’s leading health research platform, developing more new treatments for patients.