Every fortnight Kevin writes a "Kev's Column" for the Torbay Weekly and you can read the latest edition (Published on Thursday 12th January 2023) below:
NHS
Over the last month the NHS has been under immense pressure as the impacts of both Covid and Flu are felt.
Figures for the week leading up to New Year’s Day, showed there were 5,105 patients with flu in general and acute hospital beds, with 336 in critical care beds. Compare this to the same week last year, where there were only 38 flu cases in general and acute beds and just 2 in critical care beds. When combined with there being an average of 9,390 patients in hospital with COVID every day, it is easy to see how the pressure has built up on the system overall.
Given the scale of these numbers an impact on wider health services was inevitable, especially when combined with treatment backlogs from the pandemic period. I have therefore had several residents get in touch to highlight their concerns and specific experiences, mostly relating to waits for ambulances when calling 999. I have raised with Health Ministers how resolving this problem must be the priority.
As the New Year starts, we will see additional Government funding coming into social care services locally, vital for expanding the number of places to care for people ready to leave hospital, plus work will imminently start at Torbay Hospital on a new £15m project to build more operating theatres for day surgery cases, helping deal with treatment backlogs. We should also see further progress towards the major rebuild project for Torbay Hospital pledged under the Health Infrastructure Programme.
Local health teams are working hard to meet the pressures on our NHS, 2023 must be the year we deliver the projects and changes they need to support them in doing so.
Lifeboats
On Tuesday I got the chance to highlight in the House of Commons the immense contribution of lifeboat services to search and rescue.
A lifeboat station was first established in Brixham back in 1866, with the Torbay RNLI responding to 111 shouts in 2022. There are 35 crew members (including shore based), the majority volunteers with day jobs alongside being ready to respond should the call come to do so.
Those who volunteer to man the lifeboats do so in the knowledge they could be called on to face the roughest seas and the most difficult of challenges, with all the dangers this brings. These risks being remembered last month when the 40th anniversary of the Penlee Lifeboat Disaster was marked, a tragedy which saw all 8 men on board lose their lives whilst trying to save others.
The lifeboat service sees our nation coming together to support those in peril on the sea.
Surgery Times
My next surgeries are on: Saturday 14th January 11am till 1pm at Paignton Library, Great Western Rd, Paignton, TQ4 5AG and Friday 20th January 3pm till 5pm at Torquay Library, Lymington Road, Torquay TQ1 3DT.
For an appointment you can either email me at [email protected] or leave a message on 01803 214989, surgeries are for personal queries from residents they would like me to help them with, rather than a wider policy debate. There are also drop-in sessions at my office 5-7 East St, Torquay, TQ2 5SD between 10am & 1pm Monday to Friday where a member of my team will be available to help with any queries.
