North East's Nightingale hospital remains on standby amid rising Covid-19 patient numbers

Sunderland’s site, which is equipped with 460 ventilated beds, is yet to treat a patient, but is still prepared ready to take admissions, Newcastle-upon-Tyne Hospitals NHS Trust has confirmed today, Monday, December 29.

It comes after NHS England insisted London’s own is also on standby for use, despite the removal of some equipment from the site, with reports beds and ventilators have been taken away from the ExCel centre.

England’s hospitals are currently seeing more Covid-19 patients than at the first-wave peak of the virus in April.

NHS England sent a letter to trusts on Wednesday, December 23, asking them to plan for the use of additional facilities such as the Nightingale hospitals amid rising numbers of patients with the virus.

In addition to Sunderland’s site, which is based on the International Automotive Manufacturing Park (IAMP) just a short distance from Nissan's plant, other Nightingales in England have been set up in Manchester, Bristol, Harrogate and Birmingham.

A spokesperson for the NHS said the capital site remains poised to take patients and will be available to support its hospitals if needed.

But concerns have been raised around the already-stretched health service’s ability to staff Nightingale facilities.

Dr Nick Scriven, immediate past president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said: “It is not ‘just the case’ of using the Nightingale hospital as there are simply no staff for them to run as they were originally intended (mini intensive care units).

“They could play a role perhaps if used as rehabilitation units for those recovering but, again, where do we find the specialist staff – the NHS simply does not have the capacity to spare anyone.”

Shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said the Nightingale hospitals had been opened “at great expense and fanfare”.

The Labour MP tweeted: “But the reality is years of Tory failures to invest in training and staffing has left NHS short of staff needed.”

City of Durham’s Labour MP Mary Foy said: “With some hospitals at breaking point, it seems the Nightingales remain unused.

"Pitched as a safety net against Covid-19, instead they're an expensive Government PR stunt without the workers to staff them.

"More proof that the NHS is nothing without its staff.”

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