STP chair says care home residents paid ‘huge price’ for emptying of acute beds

HSJ reports that at a webinar on health and social care Patricia Hewitt, the chair of Norfolk and Waveney STP and former health secretary, said there was a ‘huge price paid’ by care home residents from the ‘emptying’ of acute beds in March.

The hospitals sped up discharges to social care settings in March due to instructions from national NHS leaders.

She said: “Emptying acute beds, which was essential…came at a high price and it was paid by those patients in social care or transferred to social care who already had covid-19 or [subsequently] got it.

Full story in The HSJ, 14 May 2020