Practolo Blog

Friday, October 30th, 2009

Bacteria Contamination Reports Result in Fine for NHS Trust

Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has issued a cautionary notice to all hospitals to conduct regular checks to ensure that their water supply systems have pure and safe water.

The warning follows on the heels of a judgement involving a Liverpool-based NHS Trust hospital. The Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospital NHS Trust was charged with breaching the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 and was asked to pay nearly 48,000 pounds as fines and costs after it pleaded guilty to the charge. The hearing took place at Liverpool Magistrates Court.

High levels of legionella bacteria were detected in the water supply system of the hospital by HSE. This water was directed to all the sinks, showers and baths inside the hospital. HSE investigators noted that both the patients and the employees were exposed to risks by the water. However, they were not able to say with certainty if the two deaths in 2007 where the patients had developed legionnaires’ disease could be attributed to the contamination of water in the hospital.

It was revealed that the top management had not regularised a system of checks for detecting and preventing contamination of water, despite a May 2002 check that had revealed the presence of this bacteria in one wing of the hospital. The court was told that the NHS Trust had stopped testing water for legionella in recent times.

HSE inspector Kevin Jones said that putting patients who already have a weak immunity to further risks amounted to gross negligence. He slammed the NHS Trust for not taking a serious view of the situation and called upon authorities to see that such health and safety risks do not resurface in future.

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This entry was posted on Friday, October 30th, 2009 at 4:50 am and is filed under The Healthy Way, Web of Lawyers, Your Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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