Theresa May has been urged to tighten checks on private hospitals used by the NHS after a Labour MP raised the case of a young patient with an open wound who contracted MRSA on a private mental health ward.
Louise Haigh, a Labour frontbencher, called for the NHS to thoroughly investigate the quality of care before it commissions beds and treatment from private providers.
She cited the case in her of a “young women with MRSA with open wounds” on a child and adolescent mental health ward at Cygnet hospital Sheffield, which a report by a healthcare watchdog rated as inadequate in terms of safety.
“NHS England commissions child and adolescent mental health beds at a private hospital in my constituency, which recently received a damning Care Quality Commission report,” she said.
“Does the prime minister share my concern that a shortage of mental health beds risks the NHS placing vulnerable young people in unsafe environments, and will she consider giving NHS England the responsibility for, and the resources to investigate, the quality of care before it commissions?”
In response, May promised to ask Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, to investigate, while highlighting a “a number of steps to improve mental health” provision in the NHS, including an increase in funding.
Article from The Guardian, 20 July 2017