5,500 sign up to petition on children’s ward closure

More than 5,000 people have signed a petition in just 48 hours after it emerged that a children’s ward will have to close to in-patients for the third time in six years.

Thousands flocked to sign the “Save Our Kids Ward” petition after it was announced the paediatric ward at St John’s Hospital in Livingston would close to in-patients from 7 July due to a staffing crisis.

From this date onwards the ward will operate as an assessment unit during the day, with children being seen in the hospital’s emergency unit overnight and at weekends.

A petition launched by Labour’s Neil Findlay has now gained almost 5,500 signatures.

He said: “In 48 hours we have seen almost 5,500 people sign the petition – that shows the strength of feeling and disappointment that people have in regard to what’s happening. I’ll be making the government very much aware of the strength of feeling in the local community.”

NHS Lothian’s chief officer of acute services, Jacquie Campbell, said: “If we don’t make changes now to the operating hours of the children’s ward, we run the risk of having to make an unplanned closure at a few hours’ notice, which would lead to the sudden diversion of patients.”