Britain’s crumbling hospitals
Patients in danger as ceilings rot, sewage overflows and pipes burst
NHS hospitals are in such a poor state that collapsing ceilings and burst sewage pipes are putting patients at risk, a report reveals.
Buildings are crumbling into such disrepair that last year almost half the NHS health trusts in England had to cancel operations or saw patients suffer after major infrastructure failings.
Simon Stevens, NHS chief executive, said the health service needed £6billion to carry out urgent maintenance repairs, warning that ageing hospitals pose a ‘significant risk’ to patients.
He said the situation will continue to deteriorate without an urgent ‘gear change’ in hospital infrastructure investment.
Several old hospital buildings are falling apart, with the A&E unit of the Royal Hospital in Liverpool flooding ten times last year due to fractured pipes. In the West Midlands, newborn babies could not be kept warm when the heating broke on a maternity ward, the report reveals.
In another incident at a hospital in the East Midlands, sewage came through bathroom drains and flooded the ward corridor, meaning 19 patients shared the use of one shower. Hospital managers have complained they have no money to fix rotting ceilings, windows and broken sewage pipes.
Other examples include an A&E unit that was partly closed due to a sewage leak, nurses getting trapped in a broken lift, and
‘Repair bill already tops £6billion’
a hospital ward being evacuated after water burst through the ceiling.
Experts warned that patients’ lives were being put at risk as hospitals ‘literally fell apart around them’. One patient narrowly avoided being hit by a beam which fell from the ceiling, while another was covered in slime that spurted up through a broken sink as he lay in bed.
Details of the incidents were obtained by Labour under a Freedom of Information request to hospitals in England.
Of the 170 trusts that responded, 76 had experienced clinical service incidents last year when patient care was severely compromised by infrastructure failures. Several said they had been forced to cancel X-rays, operations or appointments due to various shambolic failures.
At one trust in Yorkshire and the Humber, faeces came through the floor in the ultrasound corridor.
Shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said: ‘Years of Tory cuts are pushing hospitals to rack and ruin – from ceilings collapsing, sewage pipes bursting to central heating faltering.’ NHS bosses have complained about the poor state of buildings and facilities, calling for a £50billion government ‘bond’ to spend on infrastructure. Some 43 per cent of NHS buildings are more than 30 years old and 18 per cent pre-date the founding of the NHS in 1948.
The £6billion maintenance repair bill is a rise of £500million in just one year. Deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, Saffron Cordery, said: ‘Funding for vital repairs and upgrades is consistently used to shore up the day-to- day running of the service. This is unsustainable.’
Helen McKenna, senior fellow at The King’s Fund, an influential think-tank, said: ‘Patients can be put at risk as NHS staff have to cope with faulty equipment in buildings that are litera l l y falling apart.’
A Department of Health spokesman said: ‘ We want patients to receive world-class care so we’re investing to upgrade facilities. The NHS Long Term Plan, backed by an extra £ 3.9billion a year by 2023/24, sets out ambitions to further modernise the health service over ten years and we will consider capital funding proposals in the Spending Review later this year.’