The national scandal that is the NHS: - the 'Health' service that harms, and even kills, far too many of the people who use and pay for it.

Where to start? - There is such a mass of evidence of appallingly poor hygiene and appallingly poor care amounting, in my opinion, to cruelty, in yesterday's reports that shocked and shamed and horrified our nation...

Healthcare Commission Report

Case studies: Wretched death of C.diff victims - Telegraph


Extract:

"Everything was going well, the hip was fixing, then four days after her operation to mend her hip we were told she had diarrhoea. As far as we knew that's all she had. We were not told that she had C.diff.

"She was left in her own soiled sheets and was sobbing because nobody had cleaned her up. Her treatment was appalling. She was not being fed properly, not being cleaned, and there was only one commode between six patients. She didn't die of a broken hip, she died of hospital neglect."

Mrs Stewart said she was considering suing Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust. She said she was "not surprised" by the Healthcare Commission's revelation of so many deaths from C.diff.

"They seemed to be taking bodies away every five minutes," she said."

Superbug boss has record of dirty hospitals - Telegraph

Extract:

"Asked what she intended to do about the filthy wards at her hospital, Rose Gibb insisted she had introduced an "action plan" that would "address the issues" of inadequate cleaning.

This classic piece of management-speak was delivered in March 2001, when Miss Gibb was implicated in the first of a string of hygiene scandals at three separate NHS trusts.

The Daily Telegraph has learned that Miss Gibb, who rose to the £150,000-a-year post of chief executive of the Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust before she left the job last week, has an unenviable track record of presiding over dirty hospitals where infections have been able to spread.

Despite this, Miss Gibb has been richly rewarded by the NHS, which may yet give her £250,000 in severance pay if the Health Secretary's attempt to block it is ruled illegal."

I hope this woman receives a prison sentence...

Pay-off to superbug hospital chief is blocked - Telegraph

Read what ordinary citizens have to say about these disgraceful matters: - Health Secretary intervenes in superbug row: Have your say: How worried are you about hospital hygiene?

Deaths caused by two superbugs soar as health inspectorate accuses UK government

Deaths caused by two superbugs soar as health inspectorate accuses government

Extract:

"The number of deaths caused by two superbugs soared in 2005, raising new concerns over the standard of hygiene at hospitals across the country. According to government statistics, the number of deaths linked to MRSA rose by 39% in 2005 and deaths linked to a second superbug, Clostridium difficile, increased by 69%.

The head of the health inspectorate accused the government yesterday of failing to give enough priority to patient safety while Age Concern accused it of shirking responsibility for cleaning hospitals.

Levin Wheller of the Office for National Statistics said cases of superbugs had increased dramatically since MRSA emerged in the 1990s. C. difficile is now recorded as the cause or a factor in more than twice as many deaths as MRSA: 1,629 people died after contracting MRSA and 3,807 after C. difficile in 2005.

The new figures show that C. difficile-related deaths now outnumber deaths on UK roads. In 2005, 3,201 people were killed in road accidents, a 1% fall on 2004.

Men are twice as likely to contract MRSA as women. Mr Wheller suggested one reason could be personal hygiene; other factors might include the type of operations they are having. The vast majority of deaths were among the over-75s."

See Thousands of hospital staff fail to wash hands correctly

Dirty Hands, Dirty Health Service (UK) - The reason we have MRSA and C Diff on hospital wards?

Dirty Hands, Dirty Health Service (UK) - The reason we have MRSA and C Diff on hospital wards?

Dirty hands, Dirty Health Service

Extract:

"We are told that all the major advances in health in the last 100 years are the result of improved public sanitation and hygiene and not medicine and yet here I saw health practitioners and managers failing to do what they should have been taught as children.

Is it any wonder that we have MRSA and C Diff on our wards if hand washing is not practised in public conveniences let alone hospital corridors?"

Doctors who do not wash their hands after visiting the toilet should be severely disciplined. - I suggest that sacking them would be appropriate for a start...