Hospitals, GP surgeries and police forces across the UK have been thrown into disarray by a global Microsoft outage, as critical services scramble to restore their systems.
Police forces nationwide confirmed that their operations had been affected, while NHS sources described the healthcare system as facing “widespread” and “serious” disruption. Staff reported being locked out of the email and IT systems they depend on to deliver patient care.
Patients collecting prescriptions were cautioned to expect delays, and schools and universities found themselves unable to access their email accounts.
There were further reports that ambulance services had also been caught up in the outage.
The disruption first emerged late on Thursday afternoon, leaving users unable to reach many of Microsoft’s most widely used platforms. Thousands of people around the world reported being unable to send or receive messages through Outlook.
Charles Lamanna, Microsoft’s executive vice-president, said the outages did not appear to stem from a cyber-attack. By Friday morning, the company reported seeing “early signs of stabilisation”.
NHS staff clocking in on Friday morning said they could not access email, hampering their ability to provide care in hospitals and surgeries, with warnings that the outage would cause significant disruption throughout the day.
In some cases, workers resorted to their personal phones to reach Microsoft Teams, a platform heavily relied upon across the health sector, though meetings were being called off across the board.
Several NHS organisations turned to social media to issue apologies, asking patients to refrain from emailing and to call instead.
Rachel Harrison, GMB national secretary, said: “The Microsoft data outage is having a serious impact across ambulance and NHS trusts. Luckily emergency and life-threatening callouts appear to be unaffected.”
Pharmacy sources told the Guardian they too were cut off from email, warning that the outage was disrupting their communication with some GP practices over prescriptions. The impact on patients’ waiting times for medication was “significant”, they said.
A spokesperson for the National Pharmacy Association said: “We are aware of the disruption impacting pharmacies today, including access to NHS email systems, due to national issues with Microsoft. This affects a pharmacy’s ability to communicate with GP practices and some patients.
“Please bear with your pharmacy teams today, where waits may be longer than normal and there may be delays to some prescriptions.”
Meanwhile, government engineers were collaborating with Microsoft to gauge the scale of the disruption, according to a minister, while the Welsh government said it was activating contingency plans.
Luke Pollard, minister for defence readiness and industry, told Times Radio: “Government engineers and the systems are working with Microsoft at the moment. I would expect that to be able to be detailed throughout the day. But as more people come online with their working days shortly, I think there’ll be sadly more people frustrated with the system.”
Pollard argued that the outage underscored the need for “greater resilience” against technology failures.
He told the Today programme on BBC Radio 4: “My appetite for disruption when it comes to using my phone is virtually zero. I imagine that’s the case for every one of your listeners, that people want it to work all the time, every time, and we’re seeing more disruption from those tech companies. That’s partly because we’ve become more dependent on technology.”
The Metropolitan, Northampton, Hertfordshire, South Wales, Dyfed-Powys and Dorset police forces all reported that their systems had been affected. Access to Microsoft products used by MPs was also unavailable.
A parliamentary spokesperson said: “We are aware of the global issue affecting Microsoft email services, which is impacting users of the parliamentary network. We are working with Microsoft to resolve the matter as quickly as possible.”
