WHIPPS CROSS IN CRISIS

The Government’s minister for Health, Patricia Hewitt, claims that this is the best year ever for the NHS - well not for Whipps Cross hospital and those who use it. The hospital is having to make cuts of £33 million. To do this the hospital has had to:

· close the Margaret Day Centre;
· close one ward already, with another 100 bed ward to close ;
· close one operating theatre - another may have to close;
· declare repeated Red Alerts (called when no beds are available) throughout the year - goodness knows what will happen if we have a hard winter;
· ask patients to wait longer for essential medical equipment like specialist wheelchairs;
· axe over 400 jobs, 276 of which will be staff redundancies.

Already the planned new ‘state of the art’ hospital we have been promised for years is officially ‘off the agenda’ and there are rumours that the hospital will close and the building may be used for just an accident and emergency facility. So much for our Labour MP’s promise during the General Election for a Super Hospital with more staff, and then in December 2005 his website quoted “What is now being considered is an alternative staged redevelopment rather than a single contract. I am in discussion both with the Hospital and with Ministers at the Department of Health to ensure that this gets the go-ahead”
The Focus Team says: Waltham Forest has areas of deprivation - a factor in ill health. It is an outrage that these cuts have been made - with possibly more to come. The staff at Whipps Cross continue to work against the odds to ensure good health care for patients. Support them by fighting the cuts and the possible closure of parts of our local hospital.