On New Year’s Eve Stepping Hill Hospital posted to their official Twitter account warning people to stay away except for absolute emergencies.

 

At one point on New Year’s Eve there were 68 people waiting to be seen in the A&E department with people who were not critically ill having to wait many hours.  More typically a busy day might see 40 people waiting.

 

A hospital statement said “Our staff are ensuring the best possible care is provided to everyone, but they are rushed off their feet. The plea is therefore for people to only come to our A&E if it is an absolute emergency. This department is for critical or life threatening conditions.”

The hospital has had a lot of bad news recently with a ward closed, hundreds of redundancies announced and large increases to car park charges.

Local Liberal Democrat Councillor Jon Twigge is worried: “With even the Red Cross recently declaring that the NHS is in a humanitarian crisis our hospital is clearly under too much pressure already, what would it be like if the GMSF plans were allowed  to go unchallenged and another 4000 homes were built at High Lane?

“We (Stockport Liberal Democrats) are calling for our Council to withdraw from the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework so that Stockport Council can create its own local plan independently, taking into account our own local needs and ensuring that local infrastructure will be planned properly and not regularly overwhelmed like this.”

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