Icu beds are a function of staffing long before equipment is a limitation. We've fired nurses and not rebuilt over the last 18 months. If nothing has been done to address staffing for seasonal diseases in that time, it's either incompetence or by design. This is why hospitals run at or near capacity all year round and have capacity issues every flu season. It's a business decision. It also happens to be easily exploited by the narrative.

You can go back and look at 10+ years of UK NHS "hospitals desperately overwhelmed" annual articles. Just because you hadn't heard of it before doesn't mean it isn't normal.