My next-door neighbour is 86 and has lived in our village since she was six, when her father was killed in the war and her mother had to move in with her aunt and uncle.

Her uncle was a mechanic and looking after all of them pushed him to the financial brink. He had a heart attack when he was 56 in the kitchen while eating dinner one night. As they had no money to call the doctor out to help him, they watched him die in front of them.

It's a terrible story and it looks like the UK is voting with its money to bring about the re-privatisation of health care.

In the middle of a cost of living emergency and global recession a recent YouGov polling for the IPPR found that 17 per cent of people would go private if they knew they were going to have to wait longer than 18 weeks – the maximum time the NHS says anyone should have to wait before having planned hospital treatment.

And many people are already doing so. There were 69,000 self-funded treatments in the UK in the final three months of last year – a 39 per cent rise on the same period before the pandemic.

The numbers paying for such treatments topped 250,000 last year. These figures do not include those who have private insurance: they are the people paying the full cost of treatment themselves, leaving them liable for huge bills. In addition, people are increasingly turning to private GPs, diagnostics and consultants to speed up their treatment, even if they later return to NHS treatment.

One leading healthcare insurer has reported an 81 per cent increase in self-pay spending - meaning people who pay for health care themselves instead of using private health insurance - between April and June compared to the same period in 2019.

This certainly correlates with the record 5.6 million people who were waiting to start hospital treatment at the end of July in England alone.

A report commissioned by the British Medical Journal reported that of 3466 UK adults surveyed, almost a third (31 per cent) struggled to access the care they needed during the pandemic

So are people being driven by desperation into private healthcare? Or is this just another example of the rapidly widening inequalities in the UK - and that increasingly people are inclined to put themselves first?

Because and let's be blunt about this: private doctors and consultants are the same people as NHS ones. So, for every private appointment which is fast tracked through, someone who can't afford to pay gets pushed further down the queue.

At an increase of 81 per cent year on year of people taking private health insurance, how long will it be before UK citizens are left to die on the floor as their families can't afford healthcare? It's a distressing thought and one that most of us couldn't bear to contemplate.

But - many of us are contributing to this either unwittingly or in full knowledge that we're paying to help ourselves at the detriment of others.

Is this likely to become a major issue for us? The Institute for Public Policy Research thinks that there is a serious risk of a two-tier system emerging - rather like our current education system, with access to the top tier limited by wealth.

If this were to become the new normal after the pandemic (as it has in social care and dentistry), it would worsen overall health and widen inequality.

Recently the NHS said that they are predicting to be in crisis this winter due to the scale of people needing to be seen as they suffer the health impacts of the cost of living crisis, with complications of hunger and hypothermia being high on the agenda. People will die this winter due to poverty.

So, what can we do to slow the trend? On a personal and practical scale, we can, if we are lucky enough to be able to afford it, consider whether we want to take the plunge into private healthcare.

It’s expensive and if there are any complications or problems you may end up back under NHS care. If you are struggling to get responses from your health care provider then we can guide you through the complaints system, it may speed up responses and save you thousands of pounds.

Currently, the number one reason young people go to A&E is to have a tooth extraction, as they can’t find an NHS dentist who will take them as patients. Our National Head Office is campaigning on this, come and see if we can help you find a dentist to take you on.

Let’s try to work together to preserve resources. We’ll help, but we’re a charity and we rely on you too!

Fiona McCulloch is chief executive of Citizens Advice York