Too many hospitals are coasting along, settling for meeting minimum standards, Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt will tell an audience in Dorking today.
In a speech at the Nuffield Trust's health policy conference at the Wotton House Hotel, Mr Hunt will attack a culture of "complacency" and "low aspirations", which he believes is holding the NHS in England back.
He is expected to say this afternoon that while there is a concerted effort to tackle failing hospitals, there should also be a focus on "mediocrity".
"Coasting can kill. Not straight away, but over time as complacency sets in, organisations look inwards, standards drop and then suddenly something gives," the MP for South West Surrey will say.
"I would never describe the majority of hospitals or wards in the NHS as mediocre - but I do believe our system fails to challenge low aspirations in too many parts of the system.
"Imagine for a moment that the main objective for our Olympic athletes was not to win but to 'not come last'. How many gold medals would we have won then?
"It sounds ridiculous doesn't it? But today I want to suggest that too much of the NHS is focused on doing just that.
"Not on achieving world class levels of excellence - the gold medals of healthcare - but meeting minimum standards, the equivalent of 'not coming last'."
Katherine Murphy, of the Patients Association, has said the health secretary was right to draw attention to the issue.
"There is a malaise in the NHS which has allowed mediocrity to become commonplace," she said.
"We hear from patients every day who are not happy with their care. I am not talking about the really bad, just those that are not putting patients first."
But shadow health secretary Mr Burnham has said it was "no good for ministers to blame hospitals and staff when it is they who have thrown the whole system into chaos with a huge re-organisation, which has siphoned £3bn out of front line care.
"Hospitals across England are on a knife-edge and they need a government that provides support rather than points the finger," he said.
Royal College of Nursing director general Peter Carter said: "From one perspective I absolutely agree with him, of course we don't want mediocrity.
"But to make sure that does not happen we need to invest in staff. When we won one gold medal in the 1996 Olympics we started investing in our athletes, rowers and cyclists.
"To achieve gold medal standards in the NHS we need to do the same. It requires proper leadership, time to train and appropriate pay."
