Nurses are facing “abhorrent” levels of violence as attacks in A&E wards have almost doubled in the last five years, new figures reveal.

Nurses have been punched, spat at and even had a gun pointed at one of them in A&E departments.

Long waits in A&E are also leading to anger among patients who are not prone to violence, the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said as it called for more to be done to protect NHS staff.

The nursing union submitted Freedom of information (FOI) requests to NHS hospitals with accident and emergency departments and found rates of violence towards staff had almost doubled in the last five years.

Figures from 89 hospital trusts, out of a possible 129, revealed there were 4,054 cases of physical violence against A&E staff recorded in 2024, up from 2,093 in 2019.

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