NHS Wales: A&E waits not under-reported, insists Mark Drakeford

Senior doctors and Welsh ministers are at loggerheads on the issue

First Minister Mark Drakeford has insisted Wales' A&E waiting times have not been under-reported and can be compared with England's figures.

It follows claims - strongly denied by the Welsh government - that thousands of patients are missing from official statistics.

Published waiting times show Welsh hospitals have recently performed better than those in England.

But a group representing emergency doctors has questioned that.

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At question time in the Senedd, opposition leaders asked Mr Drakeford to confirm all patients were being counted.

Welsh Conservative group leader Andrew RT Davies referred to information published by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, suggesting that 45,000 patients had not been counted in published data between January and June.

Mr Drakeford said: "If there has been any misunderstanding of the data the misunderstanding does not lie with the Welsh government.

"We do not exclude clinical exceptions from the data reported and the data that we do report is comparable with data reported elsewhere as we always have maintained."

He added "not a single patient's care" is affected by these figures.

Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth said the royal college had "frequently raised A&E under-reporting with ministers and officials".

But Mr Drakeford insisted the "figures are not under-reported".