The NHS Dental Statistics for England 2023/24 show just 40.3% of adults were seen by an NHS Dentist in the 24-months up to 30 June 2024, up by less than a percentage point on last year’s figures (39.6%) and lagging behind the same period to September 2019 when the proportion stood at 49.4%.
Just 56.1% children were seen by an NHS dentist in the 12 months up to 30 June 2024, compared to 59.7% in the year to September 2019.
34.1 million courses of NHS dental treatment were delivered in England in 2023/24, up just 4.3% on the previous year, and lightyears from the 39.7 million delivered pre-pandemic in 2018/19, a time when access problems were already widespread across the country. Total Units of Dental Activity delivered increased by just 3.4% from 2022/23.
The 24,335 dentists recorded as delivering NHS dentistry in the last year represent increase of a mere 0.5% on 2022/23 figures and fails to recover ground lost since lockdown. The professional body warn the numbers understate the full scale of losses. Official data counts heads, not NHS commitment, giving the same weight to a dentist doing a single NHS checkup a year as an NHS full timer. The BDA warn that the growing number of dentists reducing the amount of NHS work they do are effectively going untracked in these figures.
The period covered by the new figures includes the rollout of the previous government’s Recovery Plan, which failed to confront the discredited NHS contract fuelling both workforce and access crises.
The Labour Party pledged contract reform in its manifesto, and the BDA has been encouraged by early talks with the new government. It says that maintaining momentum is key to meeting the huge unmet need for dentistry and keeping demoralised dentists on board, and that government will need to demonstrate both urgency and ambition.
BDA analysis of GP Survey data out last month indicated unmet need for NHS dentistry in England now stands at 13 million, or over 1 in 4 of the adult population. Pre-pandemic numbers stood at around 4 million, or 1 in 10 of the adult population.
BDA Chair Eddie Crouch said:
“Tweaks at the margins have failed to deliver for millions struggling to access NHS dentistry.
“The last government said its recovery plan would make things faster, simpler and fairer.
“The reality is the recovery has stalled, and a new government needs to offer real change to give this service a future.”