Written question asked by Paul Burstow (Liberal Democrat) on Tuesday, 29 April 2003, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Monday, 12 May 2003. It was answered by Hazel Blears (Labour) on Monday, 12 May 2003 on behalf of the Department of Health.

Dept of Health

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many wards have been shut down to prevent the spread of healthcare-acquired infections in each of the last three years. - Inc fact that there are no centrally held statistics on the number of ward closures due to healthcare associated infections and ref to data on (MRSA) at www.phls.co.uk/publications/cdr/PDFfiles/2002/cdr2502.pdf.

Answer: Mr. Burstow: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many wards have been shut down to prevent the spread of healthcare-acquired infections in each of the last three years. [111044] Ms Blears: There are no centrally held statistics on the number of ward closures in hospital trusts due to healthcare associated infections. However, the Department of Health does collect data on methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus bacteraemia (MRSA) for every acute National Health Service hospital trust in England, as part of a mandatory surveillance scheme for healthcare associated infection. Results for the first year of this scheme, from April 2001 to March 2002, were published in the Communicable Disease Report Weekly or. 20 June 2002 and are available on the Public Health Laboratory Service website at www.phls.co.uk/publications/cdr/PDFfiles/ 2002/cdr2502.pdf.

Secondary information

Type: Written question
Reference: 111044; 405 c105W
Session: 2002-03
Subjects: Closures Hospitals Disease control Infectious diseases Hospital wards MRSA
Link: View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk