The National Health Service (NHS) is the "public face" of the three widely funded health care systems of Great Britain (Northern Ireland does not use the title) and the full title of the national public health service for England.

The NHS provides the majority of healthcare in England, from common practitioners to Accident and Emergency Departments, long-term healthcare and dentistry. It was founded in 1948 and has become an integral division of English society, culture and everyday life: the NHS was once described by Nigel Lawson, former Chancellor of the Exchequer, as "the national religion". Private health care has continued similar to the NHS, paid for largely by private insurance, but it is used only by a little percentage of the population, and generally as a top-up to NHS services.

NHS services are mainly "free at the point of delivery", paid for by taxes; the NHS's budget for 2006–07 is £96 billion. Employing well over 1 million public, the NHS is the largest employer in Europe and one of the largest employers in the world, (supposed to be third or fifth, according to different commentators). A learn by Professor Nick Bosanquet for the Reform think tank predicts an annual shortage of nearly £7bn in 2010.

The NHS is frequently the goal of criticism. For example, levels of the MRSA "super bug" in UK hospitals have been the matter of scrutiny in recent years. The ongoing NHS IT improve has also been subject to recent scrutiny. Availability of NHS dentistry is deprived, with by March 2006 two million people in the UK trying but failing to record with an NHS dentist and overall figures of 55% of adults and 36% of children not registered with an NHS dentist. Following the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) hospital building programmer, many hospitals have found themselves in debt.

Several high profile scandals have also been accredited to the NHS over the years such as the Alder Hey organs scandal and the current death of a 9 year old boy died when a breathing device was re-used.