The 10-year plan in action: 43 neighbourhood health services

In our previous analysis of the 'Fit for the Future' 10-year plan, we examined the strategic shift towards community-based care. Health Secretary Wes Streeting announced in September the initial rollout of 43 neighbourhood health services across England, supported by £10 million in funding.

This initiative is a direct expression of the plan's intent to move care out of hospitals and closer to home. Here, we analyse the announcement and its practical implications for pharma, medtech, and NHS professionals.

The announcement: what you need to know

The government has confirmed the first wave of 43 neighbourhood health services. The core details are:

• Aim: To integrate local services and bring healthcare to the doorstep, with an initial focus on people with long-term conditions such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes or arthritis.
• Funding: £10 million is allocated to support the 43 areas.
• Structure: This is not about new buildings. The model relies on a programme lead in each area to coordinate existing local services. A single neighbourhood health team will be formed, drawing on community nurses, GPs, hospital doctors, social care workers, pharmacists, dentists, paramedics, and the voluntary sector.
• Focus: The programme will begin in areas with high levels of deprivation.
• Timeline: The first services began on 9 September 2025. The ambition is to scale up the programme over the next year.

Analysis: ambition meets a modest budget

This announcement provides a test case for the 10-year plan's vision. The implications are in the details.

The first point is the funding. £10 million spread across 43 services amounts to approximately £232,000 per area. This sum is intended for coordination and setup costs, funding the programme lead and administrative integration, rather than financing new frontline capacity. The model's success will depend on its ability to make existing, and already stretched, local services work together more efficiently.

The choice of 43 areas represents a wide-scale pilot. It is not a complete national transformation, but it is more than a handful of test sites. For pharma and medtech companies, this creates 43 new, distinct access environments. Engagement, which may have been focused at an ICB or Trust level, must now adapt to the new programme leads and the unique patient pathways they design.

These new pathways will be critical. How will a medtech company introduce a new remote monitoring device for diabetics into these teams? How will pharma demonstrate the value of a new treatment for MS when the decision-making unit is a multidisciplinary team of local budget holders? Companies will need to understand the new local decision-making processes in each of these 43 areas.

Prioritising areas of high deprivation is consistent with the plan's goal of reducing health inequalities. It is also a high-risk strategy. These areas often have the most complex patient needs and the most pressured local services. If the model can succeed here, it will serve as a powerful proof of concept.

The implementation challenge

The aims of the 10-year plan, prevention, digital integration, and community care, have wide support. The difficulty, as ever, is in the execution.

This initiative lands against a backdrop of concern. As highlighted by the CQC, there has been a persistent warning that a lack of investment threatens the viability of shifting care into the community. This £10 million announcement is a welcome start, but it does not represent the large-scale capital or revenue investment many provider organisations have been calling for.

While the 43-site programme is new, models for this type of integration already exist and provide a blueprint. These initiatives, many developed locally over several years, demonstrate the core concept. The Whitehawk Health Hub in Brighton, for example, operates a drop-in service combining clinicians with mental health support and benefits advisers. Others, like the 'Wigan Deal' or the community hub in Fleetwood, successfully integrate health services with social prescribing, local government, and voluntary sector assets.

The common factor in these successful examples is the move beyond coordinating only medical care. They actively build partnerships to address the wider social determinants of health, from isolation to poverty. They provide a proof of concept, but their success has often relied on local leadership and building community trust, factors that are difficult to replicate quickly with central, top-down funding alone.

The success of these neighbourhood teams depends entirely on the workforce. The plan assumes that community nurses, GPs, pharmacists, and social care staff are available to form these integrated teams. Without new funding for additional posts, and the time to redesign patient pathways within neighbourhood teams, this becomes an exercise in redistributing an already-strained workforce.

A positive step, but a long road

This announcement is a concrete step, moving the 10-year plan from policy document to practice. For pharma, medtech, and the NHS, the future involves a more integrated, localised, and preventative care model. The immediate challenge is the reality of its implementation. This is a pilot programme with modest funding, testing a coordination model in the most difficult environments.

The ambition is welcome. The question is whether the resources and workforce are in place to make it a reality. Further clarity on the wider financial landscape may be imminent. Speaking at a recent King's Fund conference, NHS England's Sir Jim Mackey indicated that details of funding rule changes for the next three years are due to be published shortly. This wider context will be important for these 43 sites. At CHASE, we’ll observe the progress of these pioneer sites with interest.

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