Experts also fear cataract removal and hernia operations will be delayed as “non-urgent” surgery is shunted down the list of priorities because money has dried up. 

NHS England chief executive Simon Stevens yesterday told a board meeting there was a limit to what could be done with the resources available. 

Before last week’s Budget he asked Chancellor Philip Hammond for a £4billion funding boost to stop the NHS going into meltdown. 

Instead, he was granted £2.8billion – consisting of £350million to avert a winter crisis, £1.6billion in 2018/19 and the rest the year after. 

Last night an NHS source told the Daily Express: “This is about choice. There is a limit to the amount of money we have got and a limit to what we can do.” 

Professor John Appleby, chief economist at health think-tank The Nuffield Trust, said: “It is clear the big question emerging from last week’s Budget is how far waiting lists for routine operations like hip and knee replacements are allowed to grow in order to preserve and improve other services like A&E and cancer care.” 

NHS England says its priorities should be to provide world class cancer, mental health and primary care [GP] services – areas it intends to “protect”. 

But other services may no longer be provided and waiting times could soar unless more cash is found. 

Sir Malcolm Grant, chairman of NHS England, told the national body’s board meeting the “tightness of the settlement” would be a “catalyst for change”, adding: “There are going to have to be some tough decisions and trade-offs.” 

Figures show the waiting list for orthopaedic referrals – the majority of which are hip and knee operations – has rocketed from 376,000 in 2008 to 505,957 last year. 

More than 60,000 were not treated within an 18-week limit.

Meanwhile, NHS financial pressures could be fuelling growing costs for clinical negligence in a “vicious spiral” that could “spin out of control” without action, MPs on the Public Accounts Committee have warned.