The NHS estate is one of the oldest and most asbestos-heavy building portfolios in the country. The evidence comes from three main channels: Freedom of Information investigations by the BBC and by the Trades Union Congress with the Labour Research Department (TUC/LRD); NHS England's annual Estates Returns Information Collection (ERIC), which measures the repair backlog; and claims and mortality data surfaced through NHS Resolution, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and the Mesothelioma UK MAGS research group. This page pulls the healthcare-estate numbers together in one place — how many NHS hospitals contain asbestos, what the claims record shows, how many staff have died, and why the material is still there. Throughout, we flag which figures are official statistics and which are FOI or campaign estimates.
Key facts and figures
- Around 9 in 10 — 198 of 211 responding NHS trusts confirmed asbestos in their hospital buildings (BBC FOI, December 2018).
- 67% of NHS premises surveyed in London and Scotland still contained asbestos — 1,146 of 1,718 buildings (TUC/LRD FOI, H1 2022 data).
- 66% of those asbestos-containing NHS premises are open to public access (TUC/LRD, 2023).
- £15.9bn — the NHS backlog-maintenance bill in 2024/25, up 15.7% in a year (NHS England ERIC, published October 2025).
- 961 mesothelioma negligence claims were brought against the NHS in 2004–17; 553 succeeded (Sheffield / Mesothelioma UK MAGS study).
- 40–65 NHS workers a year are thought to develop mesothelioma, versus roughly 7 a year in official ONS figures (Mesothelioma UK MAGS update, 2023).
- £6.8m was paid out on 352 NHS asbestos-disease claims between 2013 and 2017 (BBC FOI, 2018).
- ~300,000 non-domestic buildings in the UK — hospitals among them — are still thought to contain asbestos (Work and Pensions Committee, 2022).
Figures are the latest available as of July 2026, and this page is updated when new data lands — ERIC refreshes each October, HSE publishes its mesothelioma statistics every July and its full asbestos-related disease suite every November, and NHS Resolution surfaces new claims data through its FOI disclosure log. The headline prevalence figures are one-off FOI studies and will be swapped when a successor is published.
How many NHS hospitals contain asbestos?
Around nine in ten NHS trust hospitals contain asbestos. When the BBC submitted Freedom of Information requests to NHS trusts in England in 2018, 211 responded — and 198 of them, about 90%, confirmed asbestos was present in their hospital buildings. The findings, reported in December 2018, remain the most widely cited snapshot of how deeply asbestos runs through the acute hospital estate.
The reason mirrors the picture in schools and the wider building stock: the great post-war hospital-building era ran from the 1948 founding of the NHS through to the 1970s, exactly when asbestos use in UK construction peaked. Any hospital built or refurbished before the year 2000 may contain asbestos in its pipe lagging, boiler and plant rooms, ceiling and floor tiles, sprayed coatings, partition walls and service ducts — the same asbestos-containing materials catalogued in our guide to asbestos-containing materials in UK buildings. Under the current regime, the default is not removal but management in place: asbestos in good condition, recorded and monitored, is generally left where it is until it is damaged or in the way of building work.
A more recent regional snapshot reinforces the point. In January 2023, the TUC and the Labour Research Department published FOI data covering NHS premises in London and Scotland. Of 1,718 premises and buildings surveyed, 1,146 — two-thirds (67%) — still contained asbestos. In London the median trust reported asbestos in 85% of its surveyed premises, with the upper quartile at 100%; at least 695 premises owned or used by NHS Scotland boards contained it. One important caveat on all these figures: there has been no single national census of asbestos across the whole UK hospital estate, so the numbers are stitched together from separate FOI exercises rather than one authoritative dataset.
| Measure | Figure | Data period / source |
|---|---|---|
| Responding NHS trusts confirming asbestos in hospitals | 198 of 211 (~90%) | Dec 2018 (BBC FOI) |
| NHS premises in London & Scotland still containing asbestos | 67% (1,146 of 1,718) | H1 2022 (TUC/LRD) |
| Asbestos-containing NHS premises open to public access | 66% | 2023 (TUC/LRD) |
| London trusts — median share of premises with asbestos | 85% (upper quartile 100%) | H1 2022 (TUC/LRD) |
| NHS Scotland board premises containing asbestos | At least 695 | H1 2022 (TUC/LRD) |
| NHS asbestos-disease claims paid, 2013–17 | 352 claims, £6.8m | 2013–2017 (BBC FOI) |
How many NHS buildings with asbestos are open to the public?
Two-thirds — 66% — of the asbestos-containing NHS premises surveyed are open to public access, according to the TUC/LRD FOI data published in 2023. That is the figure that separates the hospital picture from, say, a sealed industrial plant room: the asbestos in the NHS estate sits in buildings where patients, visitors and hundreds of thousands of staff pass through every day.
The Royal College of Nursing echoed the finding in its July 2023 position statement, noting that two-thirds of the surveyed NHS premises in London and Scotland still contained asbestos and that two-thirds of those were publicly accessible. It is worth being precise about what "open to public access" means and does not mean: it describes the building, not the specific location of the asbestos within it. Well-managed asbestos in a ceiling void or behind a plant-room door is not the same as exposed, damaged material in a corridor. The concern the unions raise is about how reliably that management holds up across an ageing estate under severe maintenance pressure — which is what the backlog figures below speak to.
Why hasn't asbestos been removed from NHS buildings?
The NHS backlog-maintenance bill reached £15.9bn in 2024/25 — up 15.7% in a single year and part of a long climb from £6.5bn in 2018/19, according to NHS England's ERIC data published in October 2025. The cost of clearing the highest-risk backlog alone rose 28% year on year to £3.5bn, around 22% of the total. That is the money context for why asbestos removal stalls: in a system where the basic repair bill is running into the tens of billions, wholesale asbestos stripping competes with leaking roofs, failing boilers and, in some hospitals, reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) — the "crumbling concrete" issue that has run alongside asbestos in the crumbling-hospitals story.
There is also a policy reason. Current UK law does not require asbestos to be removed; it requires it to be managed. Under Regulation 4 of the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012, an NHS body must identify the asbestos on its estate, record it, assess its condition, keep a written management plan and inform anyone liable to disturb it — the mechanism set out in our guides to the duty to manage asbestos and the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012. In practice this means removal happens piecemeal, driven by refurbishment and damage, rather than as a planned programme. In April 2022, the Commons Work and Pensions Committee recommended a 40-year deadline for removing asbestos from all non-domestic buildings, with a central register starting with schools and hospitals; the Government rejected the phased-deadline proposal in its October 2022 response, leaving the manage-in-place model in place.
| NHS backlog maintenance (England) | Figure | Trend |
|---|---|---|
| Total cost to eradicate backlog, 2024/25 | £15.9bn | ▲ 15.7% year on year |
| High-risk backlog, 2024/25 | £3.5bn | ▲ 28% year on year |
| Total backlog, 2018/19 (for comparison) | £6.5bn | ▲ over six years |
| Non-domestic buildings UK-wide still containing asbestos | ~300,000 | Broadly stable |
How many NHS staff have died from asbestos exposure?
Official figures record roughly 7 NHS health-professional mesothelioma deaths a year, but claims data suggests the true toll is 40 to 65 workers a year — an undercount of somewhere between five- and nine-fold. This is the central finding of the MAGS (Mesothelioma in Asbestos-exposed Groups in Society) study, run by the University of Sheffield with Mesothelioma UK, and it is the single most important number on this page.
The mechanism behind the gap is straightforward. ONS occupational-mortality data ties a mesothelioma death to the deceased's recorded occupation, and it excludes deaths over the age of 74 — yet mesothelioma is most often diagnosed late in life and has a latency of 15 to 60 years. So a nurse or maintenance worker exposed on an NHS site in the 1970s who dies of mesothelioma at 78 may never appear in the "health professional" column at all. Drawing instead on the NHS's own record of negligence claims, MAGS found that 961 mesothelioma negligence claims were brought against the NHS in 2004–17, of which 553 succeeded — a claims rate far above what the ONS death figures would predict. Officially, 177 NHS staff mesothelioma deaths were recorded in 2002–15; the claims record implies the real number is several times higher.
Nurses appear to be particularly affected. Research by Howie (2022), cited in the RCN's July 2023 position statement, found that nurses experienced roughly twice the number of mesothelioma deaths that would be expected from typical asbestos-fibre concentrations — a signal that hospital environments, not just heavy industry, have exposed healthcare staff. To be clear about status: the ONS annual figure is an official statistic, while the 40–65 range and the doubled-nurse estimate are research findings that extrapolate beyond the age-capped official series. Both point the same way.
How many asbestos claims does the NHS face each year?
NHS Resolution received 353 mesothelioma and asbestos-exposure negligence claims against the NHS over the nine years from 2013/14 to 2021/22 — around 39 a year, according to its FOI disclosure log. The MAGS study, looking at a longer and partly overlapping window on a different basis, counted 961 claims across 2004–17, which works out at a broadly similar order of magnitude once methodology is accounted for.
On the money side, the BBC's 2018 FOI investigation found that NHS trusts made 352 asbestos-disease claims payouts totalling £6.8m between 2013 and 2017. Solicitors specialising in industrial disease told the BBC the true total was far higher — three firms alone said they had recovered more than £16m in compensation for NHS-linked asbestos claimants over a similar period — because trust-reported payouts capture only part of the picture. The detail of how compensation is calculated, and how the wider UK compensation and claims landscape works, sits with our sibling asbestos compensation statistics page; here the point is narrower — the NHS is both a major duty holder and a recurring defendant in asbestos litigation.
Can I claim compensation for asbestos exposure in an NHS hospital?
Yes — an NHS body can be pursued as a negligent employer or occupier, and the claims record shows it regularly is. Where a worker developed an asbestos-related disease because an NHS trust failed to protect them from exposure on its premises, a civil claim can be brought, usually within three years of diagnosis or of knowing the disease was asbestos-related. NHS Resolution handles these claims on behalf of trusts, and its disclosure log shows tens of settled and defended mesothelioma and asbestos claims each year.
This page covers the healthcare-estate slice only. The general rules on eligibility, time limits, government compensation schemes and average settlement values are the province of our asbestos compensation statistics page, and nothing here is legal advice — anyone considering a claim should speak to a specialist industrial-disease solicitor.
How do NHS hospitals fit into the wider UK asbestos picture?
2,146 people died of mesothelioma across Great Britain in 2024, according to HSE figures published in July 2025 — down 109 on the 2,255 deaths in 2023, and below the 2011–2020 average of roughly 2,508 a year. Healthcare workers are one occupational strand within that national total, which is dominated by construction, shipbuilding and other heavy-industry trades. For those headline national figures — deaths by disease, exposure across the whole workforce and the long-term mortality trend — see our UK asbestos statistics page.
The hospital estate also connects to the other buildings where asbestos was installed at scale. The schools story runs in close parallel — see asbestos in schools statistics — as does the picture across housing and the general building stock in asbestos in UK homes and buildings. The Work and Pensions Committee's 2022 inquiry estimated that around 300,000 non-domestic buildings across the UK still contain asbestos; hospitals are among the highest-occupancy, highest-footfall examples in that stock, which is why they recur in the debate about whether managed-in-place asbestos is a durable long-term answer.
Frequently asked questions
How many NHS hospitals contain asbestos?
The most cited figure comes from the BBC's 2018 Freedom of Information investigation: of 211 NHS trusts that responded, 198 — about nine in ten — confirmed asbestos in their hospital buildings. A later TUC/Labour Research Department FOI study of NHS premises in London and Scotland found that 67% (1,146 of 1,718 buildings surveyed) still contained asbestos in H1 2022. There is no single national census, so these separate FOI exercises are the standard reference points.
How many NHS staff have died from asbestos exposure?
Official ONS occupational-mortality data records roughly 7 NHS health-professional mesothelioma deaths a year, and 177 NHS staff deaths were recorded in 2002–15. But the University of Sheffield / Mesothelioma UK MAGS study, using NHS negligence-claims data, estimates the true figure is 40 to 65 workers a year — an undercount of five- to nine-fold, mainly because official figures exclude deaths over age 74 and mesothelioma is usually diagnosed late in life.
Can I claim compensation for asbestos exposure in an NHS hospital?
Yes. Where an NHS body negligently exposed a worker to asbestos on its premises, a civil claim can be brought — normally within three years of diagnosis or of realising the illness was asbestos-related. NHS Resolution manages these claims for trusts; the MAGS study counted 961 mesothelioma claims against the NHS in 2004–17, of which 553 succeeded. This is general information, not legal advice; a specialist industrial-disease solicitor can advise on an individual case, and our asbestos compensation statistics page covers the wider claims landscape.
Why hasn't asbestos been removed from NHS buildings?
Two reasons. First, cost: the NHS backlog-maintenance bill hit £15.9bn in 2024/25, so asbestos removal competes with a vast queue of other urgent repairs. Second, policy: UK law requires asbestos to be managed, not removed, so material in good condition is generally left in place and recorded rather than stripped out. The Work and Pensions Committee recommended a 40-year removal deadline in 2022, but the Government rejected the phased-deadline proposal.
What are NHS staff and duty holders required to do about asbestos?
Under Regulation 4 of the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012, each NHS body must find and record the asbestos on its estate, assess its condition, keep a written management plan and tell anyone liable to disturb it. Under Regulation 10, estates, maintenance and contractor staff whose work could disturb asbestos need asbestos awareness training. Our guide to who needs asbestos awareness training explains where that duty applies.
For NHS estates teams, maintenance staff and the contractors who work across the hospital estate, our CPD-certified Asbestos Awareness Course covers the training required under Regulation 10 of the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012.
Work on or maintain hospital and healthcare buildings? Make sure your team can recognise asbestos before they disturb it.
Explore the Asbestos Awareness Course →Related guides
- Asbestos Statistics UK: Deaths, Exposure & Key Facts
- Asbestos in Schools Statistics UK: How Many Schools Are Affected?
- Asbestos in UK Homes & Buildings: Statistics and Facts
- Asbestos Compensation Statistics UK: Claims & Payouts
- The duty to manage asbestos: registers, plans and Regulation 4
- Who needs asbestos awareness training in the UK?
Sources & references
- TUC / Labour Research Department — Asbestos still widespread among NHS trusts and boards (January 2023)
- TUC / LRD — Asbestos still widespread among NHS trusts and boards: key findings (PDF, January 2023)
- NHS England — Estates Returns Information Collection (ERIC) 2024/25
- Health and Safety Executive — Mesothelioma statistics for Great Britain
- Mesothelioma UK — New data offers update on MAGS study findings (September 2023)
- NHS Resolution — FOI disclosure log: mesothelioma / asbestos exposure claims
- Royal College of Nursing — Position statement on asbestos in health and social care buildings (July 2023)
- National Health Executive — Nine out of 10 NHS trusts revealed to have asbestos in hospitals (BBC FOI coverage, December 2018)
- House of Commons Work and Pensions Committee — The HSE's approach to asbestos management (April 2022)
Mark writes about workplace health & safety, asbestos awareness and accredited online training for Asbestos Awareness Course, part of Online CPD Academy.