Sir George Alberti, head of emergency care for the UK’s National Health Service (NHS), said that improvements in this area over the past two years have transformed its emergency care performance so that “it is now the envy of the world.” Speaking at a late-October breakfast reception at the home of Prime Minister Tony Blair, Alberti said that at the beginning of 2003, almost one-quarter of patients spent more than four hours in Accident and Emergency (A&E) units.