Latest official data on cases of Covid-19 in hospitals are updated daily, and published on the Government’s own Covid-19 dashboard, based on data provided by NHS England, with a lag of less than a week.

However, health officials said Ms Pritchard had been referring to data comparing August 2021 with the year before.

These statistics show 22,877 Covid-19 admissions in August 2021, compared with 1,629 the previous year – a 14-fold difference.

Although more recent data is regularly published examining Covid-19 hospitalisations, they said Ms Pritchard was speaking in the context of other NHS pressures, including areas where statistics are published less frequently, and with a large lag.

Evidence of a busy NHS

Officials said that when asked about the state of the NHS, the health official – who has only been in the top job since August – looked back to talk about the strain on services this summer, before looking forward to winter.

Writing for Health Service Journal on Monday, Ms Pritchard had referred to the monthly statistics for August as evidence of how busy the NHS was.

While Covid-19 data is published much more regularly, the August data is the latest published to examine numbers of planned operations and diagnostic tests.

In the piece, Ms Pritchard said: “The latest monthly figures show that in August, for example, diagnostic tests were up around a fifth and elective procedures up around a third compared to a year ago despite admitting 14 times more Covid patients in hospital.

“And compared with the same period two years ago, pre-covid, GPs saw more patients overall and five per cent more cancer patients were referred for urgent treatment,” she added.

A challenging winter

In the piece, she expressed concern about the ability of the NHS and social care to cope this winter.

“We all know that the next 100 days are likely to be significantly more challenging and I want every member of NHS staff to know that I recognise how difficult the coming winter is going to be. I am concerned by how stretched we – and our colleagues in social care – are, before we have even reached what are traditionally the busiest winter months,” she wrote.

Ms Pritchard has been in charge of the NHS in England since August, when she replaced Lord Stevens, after two years as his deputy. She is the first woman to run the health service.