EVERY household should pay an extra £1200-£2000 a year in taxes to keep the NHS afloat, a leading independent think tank has said.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies said taxpayers "will have to pay a lot more" if the NHS is to cope with the UK's ageing population and a mounting bill for drugs and staff.

Read more: Doctors argue £400m funding boost for NHS Scotland 'not enough'

It said tax rises of 1.6-2.6 per cent of GDP should be phased in gradually over the next 15 years.

This would be equivalent to an extra £1200-£2000 per household, against a projected growth in net income of £8,500 per household over the same period.

This was "economically feasible", it said, since the UK's current tax burden - at 34 per cent of GDP - is "well below that in a number of other, economically successful, European countries, including Germany and France".

In a report today, the IFS said the extra funding required to maintain or improve the health service could no longer be raised by cuts to other budgets following eight years of austerity.

Read more: NHS bailouts will become the norm unless austerity is reversed

The think tank, which is politically neutral, said an extra £40-60 billion would have to be raised over the next 15 years through annual real terms increases in spending of 3.3-4 per cent.

It said: "It is hard to imagine raising this kind of money without increases in at least one of the biggest taxes - income tax, National Insurance and VAT.

"By way of illustration you can raise about £5 billion by increasing all the main rates of income tax by a penny, about £6 billion by putting a penny on VAT and about £10 billion if you put a penny on each of the main employee, self-employed and employer NI rates."

Reversing recent corporation tax cuts and introducing new taxes on property and wealth were also options, it said.

Health is devolved in the UK but any increases in public spending in England are automatically transferred to Scotland via the Barnett Formula, though it is up to the Scottish Government how to allocate it.

The Scottish Government also has limited powers to adjust income tax rates.

Read more: Scotland's income tax shake-up to go ahead

The report notes that while health spending per head is "marginally lower" in England and Wales compared to Scotland and Northern Ireland, it has risen faster in England since 2010 than in any of the devolved regions as "the Westminster government has given higher priority to protecting health spending".

In comparison, while adult social care spending across the UK fell by nearly 10 per cent there were "significant real increases" in Scotland.

Since 2010, health spending in the UK has grown more slowly than at any comparable period since the NHS was established in 1948.

Over the lifetime of the health service, annual increases in health spending have averaged 3.7 per cent.

Under the Coalition government, this stagnated at 1.1 per cent and has averaged 2.3 per cent under David Cameron and Theresa May's Conservative governments - lagging behind inflation.

Paul Johnson, director of IFS and an author of the report, said: “We are finally coming face to face with one of the biggest choices in a generation. If we are to have a health and social care system which meets our needs and aspirations, we will have to pay a lot more for it over the next 15 years.

"This time we won’t be able to rely on cutting spending elsewhere – we will have to pay more in tax. But it is a choice: higher taxes and a health and social care system which meets our expectations and improves over time, or taxes at current levels and a more constrained health service delivering less than we have become accustomed to."

Theresa May is expected to announce a long-term funding settlement for the NHS in July, to coincide with the 70th anniversary.

Scottish Health Secretary Shona Robison said: “Under the Scottish Government, health spending per head in Scotland is 7.5 cent higher than the UK Government allocates for England.

"Matching the UK Government’s health spending levels would result in NHS Scotland being over £880 million worse off.

“Surveys have indicated there is majority support for our approach to a fairer tax system in Scotland.

"Using the limited fiscal powers available, we have created a progressive system which will deliver more than a billion pounds over the next five years to invest in public services.”