New UK hospital turned away patients over staff shortage

LONDON: London´s temporary hospital set up to deal with coronavirus had to turn 30 patients away due to “staffing issues”, The Guardian reported Wednesday, but the government insisted the claims were “misleading”.

A planned transfer of seriously-ill patients to the 4,000-bed Nightingale Hospital in east London was “cancelled due to staffing issues”, according to NHS documents seen by the newspaper.

Staff at the facility, which has treated 41 patients since opening earlier this month, told the paper that they couldn´t get enough critical care nurses based in other hospitals to work there. But the government called the claims “misleading”, saying the hospital was ony intended as an emergency overflow if other facilities in the capital became overwhelmed.