The hospitals are actually emptier this year.

The government recruited loads more staff in the summer and bought loads of new equipment.

Their main problem now is so many staff are now off sick. This is not unusual, it's possible to be off on full pay stick leave for years in the UK gov, but it's likely that many of them are catching covid at work due to continued bad practices particularly lack of social distancing between staff. They are so scared of catching it off patients they pile on the PPE and wash 10 times then take it off and all have a cup off tea together in a tiny staffroom. You can clearly see this kind of behavior in footage from the staff themselves and the news, which is probably why camera crews have now been banned in UK hospitals.

The trouble is this is killing people and causing a scare which is going to get us into lockdown again. The majority of people now in hospital with covid went in for a different complaint and caught it in hospital but because this fact isn't being publicised people assume it's spreading round their community or schools.