‘WE ARE all very upset, my colleagues and I are being told to go and work elsewhere. We will support the meeting and the march,’ an Ealing Hospital midwife told News Line yesterday.
Ealing Hospital workers, patients and visitors bought tickets yesterday for next Tuesday’s meeting called to stop the closure of the maternity department and pledged to come on the march to occupy the following Wednesday (see ad this page).
Sandra, a nurse and Unison member, said: ‘The closure is terrible. Southall is a big community covering a big area and the women will find it very hard to travel far just for a check-up. Accessibility will be zero.’
Jas, a Unison member and medical clerk, bought her ticket and said: ‘It’s ridiculous what’s happening. Maternity is going to close and then they plan to close A&E. Slowly they are closing the whole hospital. I’ve worked here for 25-years, I had my baby here and had very good treatment. My daughter had her two children here with the best possible care.’
Dr Batu said: ‘I’m an A&E doctor and my job’s on the line. Everyone knows that once they’ve closed the maternity they will close the A&E next.’ Sarah, a student nurse, said: ‘I’m not very happy. Maternity is really needed. Women shouldn’t have to travel far.’ Louisa Caveney, a patient, said: ‘All the hospitals are overcrowded as they are, it’s crazy to close any of them. It will just lead to more overcrowding.’
Patient Andrew Watson Stone said: ‘It’s terrible to shut maternity, it’s disgusting. What about if the mother or the baby is seriously ill! It’s all down to money, cutbacks. Some of the wards have been closed, 9 and 10. They are planning to knock the whole hospital down and build flats, then what happens if you have a heart attack?’
• A busy GP surgery in London’s deprived East End is being shut after a fifth of its NHS funding was cut. The Limehouse Practice in Gill Street could be closed down after two GPs quit—leaving the surgery unable to cope with falling incomes and rising workloads. The remaining six GPs are now insecure and are also on the verge of leaving, after the NHS switched the way it funds practices in deprived areas.
‘This will be a tragic waste if we’re forced to close,’ said one of the GP partners, Dr Naureen Bhatti.
‘Doctors are now just another group of “key workers” being forced out of the East End because we can’t afford to live here any longer.’
Closure of the Limehouse Practice would strain other surgeries, with 10,000 patients struggling to find a new GP, doctors warn. Embattled GPs across East London have been running a ‘Save Our Surgeries’ campaign since the latest round of cuts began to hit practices. 22 surgeries across east London found themselves on a ‘hit list’ when the way surgeries are funded was changed last year, giving less priority to inner city areas where life expectancy is shorter compared to more affluent areas where services were calculated to be needed more.