Almost 4 million calls to the NHS 111 service were abandoned last year as callers struggled to get through to the helpline.
People calling 111 waited an average of 25 minutes to get through in December, figures released by the Department of Health and Social Care show.
Opposition parties are urging a recruitment drive for the service, with Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey accusing ministers of “burying their heads in the sand”.
An analysis of the data by the House of Commons Library shows almost one in five (17.8 per cent) of callers to NHS 111 in 2022 gave up before getting through.
In total, 3.7 million calls to the helpline were abandoned last year, the equivalent to more than 10,000 a day across the country.
Sir Ed said: “It is completely unacceptable that so many people in need of urgent medical advice are struggling to get through to NHS 111. Staff are exhausted, patients are left in pain, but still Conservative ministers are burying their heads in the sand.
“The government must urgently hire and train more staff to take 111 calls, or else millions more people will be left in pain for far too long.”
He added that local health services across the country were “at breaking point after years of neglect and underfunding” by the Tories.
“From ambulance waiting times and a lack of GP appointments, our health services are buckling under pressure,” he said.
“The Conservative government’s record on health has been a shambles and today’s figures are yet further proof that we cannot trust them to run the NHS.”
With a junior doctors’ strike looming this week, some NHS trusts across the country have been recommending patients call 111 if they need advice.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “This analysis is based on statistics from last year – since then we have published our Urgent and Emergency Care Plan to help the NHS deliver for patients, which includes increasing the number of NHS 111 call handlers to 4,800.
“Our plan will deliver one of the fastest and longest sustained improvements in emergency waiting times in the NHS’s history, with £14.1bn made available for health and social care over the next two years on top of record funding.”
Wera Hobhouse, the Liberal Democrat MP who commissioned the analysis, said: “People should be able to get the care they deserve when they need it. No one should be forced to abandon a call because wait times are so long when they are in need of urgent medical help.”
“The government must urgently address this dire situation. We need a proper long-term plan to tackle staff shortages or the NHS will be exposed to the same winter crises year after year.”
