THE NHS crisis has been “engineered in 10 Downing Street,” trade unions blasted yesterday.

A watchdog report published on Tuesday argued that health and social care services were stretched to the point where patient safety is in jeopardy.

Care Quality Commission (CQC) investigators said a toxic cocktail of staff shortages and increasing numbers of people with preventable illnesses was pushing health and care provision to breaking point.

Among services reinspected last year, 26 per cent of mental health services and 23 per cent of adult social care services originally rated good dropped at least one rating.

Two out of the 11 NHS acute hospitals reinspected also fell in the ratings.

Eleven per cent of A&E units were rated inadequate on safety, with 55 per cent deemed to need improvement.

GMB national secretary Rehana Azam stormed: “It’s a national scandal that we are the sixth-richest country and yet vulnerable people are dying because they can’t get appointments and overstretched ambulances sometimes don’t reach heart attack patients for an hour or more.

“The pay cap and unmanageable workloads are driving nurses and other professionals out of the health service.”

The National Pensioners Convention said the report reinforced the case for a new national care service.

“We know that over £5 billion has been cut from social care budgets in the last six years, and around 1.8 million older people are no longer getting the care they deserve,” NPC general secretary Jan Shortt said.

“The entire sector is overrun by private companies and every day vulnerable older people are at the sharp end of market failure.”