Conservatives pledge £10 million to tackle MRSA

The Conservatives have pledged to grant £10 million to help identify when the MRSA “superbug” is liable to infect hospital patients.

The party says that the funding would enable all NHS hospitals to utilise state of the art nasal swab testing technology, which has already been approved by health authorities in the US and Canada. The test, which provides same-day results, would enable more efficient and effective use of infection-control resources to be used in the fight against the deadly superbug, the Conservatives claim. It would also enable hospital to identify MRSA infection within hours instead of days.

Health Secretary John Reid had announced plans to introduce a pilot of the rapid swab technique in March.

The nasal swab test is part of the Conservatives ten-point plan aimed at wiping out serious hospital-acquired infections, which was announced by party leader Michael Howard today. The plan, drawn up in consultation with the Infection Control Nurses Association, includes plans to give more power to medical professional, restore matrons to hospitals and given them the power to close dirty wards, publish all MRSA infection rate data by clinical department and reward hospitals which tackle the superbug problem.

Mr Howard said that the Conservatives were committed to “urgent, practical action” to clean up Britain’s hospitals and said that the time had come to “take a stand” on hygiene standards.

However, Labour’s Health Secretary, John Reid, said that the Labour government was already tackling the problem, saying that the government had already brought introduced 3,000 matrons into the NHS and given them more power over hospital cleaning through the Matron’s Charter. He also said that Labour had outlawed cheap cleaning contracts and said that the government had already been collecting and publishing MRSA statistics since 2001.

Mr Reid said: “The Tory government got rid of matron. Now they want matron back. The Tories phased out front-line nurses’ control of cleaning by enforced contracting-out of cleaning services. Now they want more power to the front line. The Tories slashed cleaning services and provision. Now they want more cleaning. The Tory government refused to collect details of MRSA cases. Now they want to do just that.”

Health Secretary John Reid announced plans to reduce the number of MRSA infections in hospitals by half by 2008, last November. Earlier this month, he said that MRSA levels were at their lowest since recording of figures began and announced plans to publish figures every six months, in order to keep the public up-to-date with the situation.

The Conservatives have blamed the spread of MRSA on performance targets imposed on hospitals by the Labour government.

Earlier this year it was reported that the MRSA bug is believed to account for one fifth of the 5,000 deaths that are caused by infections picked up in hospitals every year.

The superbug, which is resistant to antibiotics, was responsible for almost a thousand deaths in England and Wales in 2003.

(KMcA/SP)