How many BILLIONS of pounds a year is NHS fraud and error costing the UK? Find out here

Former head of NHS anti-fraud section said that the organisation is losing a total of £7bn a year.

16:20 24 March 2014

Jim Gee, the ex-director of NHS Counter Fraud Services, has released a study claiming that NHS is losing a total of £7bn a year. £5bn is due to fraud; the other £2bn is due to financial errors. He added that the lost amount could pay for nearly 250,000 new nurses.

He said: "If the NHS is in line with the rest of the world it is losing £7bn.”

"I think fraud is one of the last great unreduced healthcare costs. And to me, putting money into it makes absolute sense."

"It's one of the least painful ways of cutting costs. It makes absolute sense to cut the cost of fraud before you cut the quality, or extent of patient services."

NHS anti-fraud teams are tasked to investigate cases that involve thousands to millions of pounds. One of their cases was that of dentist Joyce Trail from Birmingham who made millions of pounds by charging the NHS for work she had never done. She was jailed in 2012.