GPs, police and pharmacies among UK services affected by Microsoft outage

Key services across the UK including the NHS, GPs, police and pharmacies have been affected by a global Microsoft outage. NHS England said patients should still attend appointments unless told otherwise, while several large police forces are urging the public to call if they want to report a crime. Schools have also been affected by the outage.

Microsoft said services were now gradually being restored globally after a problem caused by a higher-than-usual stress on its servers, but users could still experience disruption. The government said it was working closely with the firm to assess any impact on its services, while local authorities warned that some council services were being affected. The full extent of the impact of the outage - which is affecting Outlook, Teams and Copilot - and the time it will take to restore the systems remains unclear hours after users first reported issues.

The chief executive of the NHS Alliance, which represents the healcare system in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, said the outage was affecting some services including emails.