Getting seen: GPs, dentists and preventable death
Portsmouth has run a fifth below England on GP staffing for years, fewer than three in ten adults have seen an NHS dentist, and under-75 deaths from preventable causes are 27% above the England rate — worse in every period on record.
GP and dentist access is among the most consistently raised issues by residents nationally and locally, and appears in the council's own Big Portsmouth Survey.
Affects the whole population. Preventable mortality is 27% above England and has been significantly worse in every measured period. Healthy life expectancy for men is 3.4 years below England and has fallen about four years since 2018–20.
Narrowly, and from a low base. GP staffing has recovered from its September 2023 low of 32.7 per 100,000 to 36.4, and preventable mortality fell in the most recent period from 206.7 to 192.1. Both remain well below and above England respectively.
A fifth fewer GPs than England, throughout
Portsmouth has run 20–25% below England on fully-qualified GP staffing for the whole published period. The gap was widest in September 2023 — 32.7 GPs per 100,000 patients against 43.5 nationally — and has recovered only partially since.
Fully-qualified GP FTE per 100,000 registered patients. NHS England publishes GP workforce by sub-ICB, not by local authority. Portsmouth's sub-ICB (10R) is coterminous with the city — all 125 of its LSOAs are in Portsmouth — so this is a genuine Portsmouth figure, but it counts registered patients rather than residents.
Fewer than three in ten adults have seen an NHS dentist
Fewer than three in ten Portsmouth adults have seen an NHS dentist in the past two years — 28.4% against 39.8% across England. For children the gap is wider still: 43.6% against 56.9%. Portsmouth dental contracts also delivered only around 55–66% of their contracted activity in 2024/25, against 84% nationally.
Adults seen in previous 24 months; children in previous 12 months. Percentages are on a patient-location basis (patient postcode). NHS BSA re-bases the population denominators between releases, so these figures are internally consistent but not comparable with percentages quoted from an older release.
27% above England — and worse in every period on record
Portsmouth has been significantly worse than England on under-75 deaths from causes considered preventable in every single period on record. The most recent figure — 192.1 per 100,000 against 151.2 — is 27% above the England rate.
Under-75 mortality from causes considered preventable, directly age-standardised. Portsmouth is statistically significantly worse than England in every period shown.
The healthy-years gap is far bigger than the lifespan gap
A boy born in Portsmouth can expect to live 78.1 years against 79.5 across England. But healthy life expectancy — years lived in good health — is 57.5 against 60.9, and Portsmouth male healthy life expectancy has fallen by around four years since 2018–20.
2022-24. Teal bar is Portsmouth, grey is England. Healthy life expectancy at local authority level carries very wide confidence intervals, and most Portsmouth-vs-England differences on that measure are not statistically significant. The fall over time is the more robust signal than any single year's gap.
Adult obesity, significantly worse for two years
Adult obesity in Portsmouth reached 32.3% in 2024/25 against 26.6% nationally — significantly worse than England for two consecutive years. Year 6 child obesity has been significantly worse than England every year since 2020/21.
Year 6 obesity, worse every year since 2020/21
By Year 6, roughly one child in four in Portsmouth is obese.
The adult figures come from Sport England's Active Lives survey with a Portsmouth sample of only around 320–390 respondents, so confidence intervals are wide. Smoking prevalence is not shown as a Portsmouth-vs-England difference for the same reason — the interval spans roughly ±3 points, so Portsmouth never registers as significantly different either way.
What is deliberately not shown here
A&E performance and elective waiting lists for Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust are deliberately not shown here. The trust serves a catchment of 675,000+ across Portsmouth, Havant, Fareham, Gosport and beyond — roughly three times the city's population — so its activity is not a measure of Portsmouth residents' demand or experience, and no resident-level equivalent is published. Presenting it on a Portsmouth page, even caveated, invites exactly the misreading this site exists to prevent.
NHS Hampshire and Isle of Wight Integrated Care Board
The 2025/26 NHS dental statistics and the next GP workforce release
Complaints go to the provider first, then the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman; funding and workforce are MP matters
Consistently among the most raised issues by residents, and the subject of the council's own current survey work on local priorities.
Public and political discussion indicates what people are raising. It is not evidence that a claim is true.
Verified facts
Full detail — why it matters, who else is involved, what is being done
- •NHS Hampshire and Isle of Wight ICB — Commissions primary care, community and dental services — the main local lever
- •Individual GP practices and dental contractors — Independent contractors, not NHS-managed staff
- •Department of Health and Social Care — National workforce planning, the GP and dental contracts, and funding
- •Portsmouth City Council — Public health functions — prevention, smoking, obesity, healthy weight
- •No sub-city breakdown of any health measure is published.
- •The GP Patient Survey no longer publishes results at Portsmouth's sub-ICB level — 2025 and 2026 exist only at ICB, PCN and practice level.
- •Adult obesity and smoking come from a Portsmouth sample of only ~320–390 respondents, so confidence intervals are wide and smoking never registers as significantly different from England either way.
- •Portsmouth has not returned a value on the 5-year-old dental decay survey since 2014/15.
- •No published decomposition of what drives the preventable mortality gap.
Sources & methodology (3) · last verified 2026-08-26
What could be done, and what it would cost
Full action plan →UK Stat Pack's own analysis — not Portsmouth City Council or government policy. Each item states what is officially happening, if anything.
A formally designated QA Hospital–University of Portsmouth health innovation zone
Not proposed officiallyWhy it might work, and the trade-offs
The underlying research relationship already works (KTPs, real spin-outs) — the gap is specifically the follow-on commercial space that lets a growing company stay in Portsmouth rather than relocate to Southampton Science Park or London.
Trade-offs. Portsmouth competes directly with Southampton Science Park and London for exactly this kind of scale-up tenant — space alone does not guarantee retention without a genuinely competitive offer.
How we would know it worked. Number of health-tech spin-outs remaining and scaling within Portsmouth (not just formed here); Follow-on commercial space actually delivered