A full one-quarter of NHS trust hospitals in the UK fail to meet minimum standards of cleanliness. From the story:
The Healthcare Commission reports that no improvement has been made on a year ago. In total, 103 out of 391 trusts admitted they did not achieve the minimum requirements, brought in by the Government to help combat the hospital superbugs, MRSA and Clostridium difficile.Such slovenliness is deadly. But change comes slow in centralized systems. It is crucial that however we choose to finance health care in the future, the backbone of the system must be in the private sector.
Patients groups and politicians said that it was “shocking” that one in four still did not meet the standards, despite ministers’ pledges to tackle cleanliness.
More than 8,000 deaths were related to MRSA and C. diff. The report shows that 26 per cent of trusts failed to keep facilities clean, did not have adequate infection control or follow guidelines on decontaminating reusable equipment.
