Scottish health board admits hospital water system linked to fatal infections | Scotland

Scotland’s biggest health board has finally admitted that contaminated water at a Glasgow super-hospital caused serious infections in children with cancer, linked to four deaths.

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (NHSGGC) has made a dramatic turnaround by closing its observations as part of a long-running investigation launched after deaths linked to infections, including that of 10-year-old Milly Main, who died in August 2017 after contracting an infection while recovering from treatment for leukemia.

On Monday morning, the Scottish Conservatives demanded an urgent statement from the SNP government’s Health Secretary Neil Gray on the 11-hour admission to the Scottish Hospitals Inquiry, which was set up in 2020 to examine the design and construction of Glasgow’s crisis-hit Queen Elizabeth University Hospital and the Royal Children’s Hospital, which are on the same campus.

Milly was one of two children who died at the Royal Children’s Hospital after being treated in a cancer ward which was later closed due to concerns about water contamination.

In its final submissions to the inquiry released ahead of final hearings, the health board said it accepted it was “more likely than not” that the children’s infections had “a link to the condition of the hospital’s water system”.

It adds: “The NHSGGC recognizes that, on the balance of probabilities, there is a causal link between certain infections suffered by patients and the hospital environment, in particular the water system. »

Milly’s mother, Kimberly Darroch, welcomed the admission but said she should have intervened much earlier for the families affected.

Darroch told BBC Scotland News: “As a mother, I spent six years fighting for answers that should have been given from the start.

“It is good news that the Board of Health has admitted that, on the balance of probabilities, there was a causal link between the environment and Milly’s blood infection. This recognition is an important milestone for our family, but it also highlights how hard families have had to fight just to get the truth out.”

The turnaround was hailed as a “turning point” by Scottish Labor leader Anas Sarwar, who has been lobbying the board and Scottish government for answers alongside Darroch for years.

Writing in the Scottish Mail on Sunday, he called for an investigation into ongoing corporate killings to be widened to include politicians he accuses of a “cover-up”.

Describing it as “one of the worst failures of modern Scottish public life”, Sarwar wrote: “Since the hospital opened, there have been a litany of serious problems: concerns about water safety, environmental risks, governance failures and infections which have devastated families.

“NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde has been named as a suspect in a corporate homicide investigation into the deaths of patients including 10-year-old Milly Main. In my view, the SNP ministers responsible for the cover-up should also do so, as this is a serious criminal matter.”

A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “We have set up a statutory public inquiry so that families can get their questions answered and lessons can be learned for future hospital projects.

“As the lead independent participant in the inquiry, the Scottish Government is committed to contributing to the investigation and it would therefore be inappropriate to comment further at this stage.”

An NHSGGC spokesperson said: “We remain fully committed to supporting the inquiry in its investigations. »