The government's new measures to tackle MRSA, the hospital superbug, were unveiled by John Reid this week. The health secretary launched a "matron's charter", a 10-point plan designed to improve ward cleanliness. A chief nursing officer has also been appointed to oversee hospital hygiene.
The ideas behind the charter are nothing new, explained the Daily Express: it is actually "based on instructions once issued by Florence Nightingale" during the Crimean war. But the charter also encourages nurses to be "more involved in drawing up cleaning contracts", added the Daily Mail, and gives matrons the power "to withhold payments to cleaning firms if the job is not done properly". Hospital staff are even urged to invite cleaners to staff parties, as part of a "wacky 'team-building' exercise", scoffed the Daily Star.
Alice Miles, writing in the Times, was baffled by the charter. How can MRSA be blamed on the cleaners, she asked, when it "lurks on equipment that cleaners are never expected to touch, such as stethoscopes"? And how on earth can matrons dock cleaners' pay? Cleaners "work for private companies under complex contracts with hospital trusts. How is matron to undo all that and extract twenty quid for a dirty handrail?"
The London Evening Standard sent a reporter to tour St Mary's, Paddington - one of London's "most advanced hospitals with a budget of millions and a commitment to improving hygiene". What was it like? "The filth was right there in front of my eyes," wrote Chris Millar. Lavatories "reeked of urine and dust ... lay on surfaces like a thick carpet."
St Mary's wasn't alone. An "independent scientist" hired by the Standard found "appalling levels" of MRSA at five London hospitals.
The Sun, meanwhile, argued that "useless" NHS bosses are really to blame for the squalor. They must be swept away with all the "filth from the wards", it said. But the paper was impressed by the new chief nursing officer, Chris Beasley. With her "chubby cheeks" and "double chins", said the paper, she is the spitting image of Hattie Jacques, the "battleaxe matron" from the Carry On films. Perhaps "those MRSA bugs have no chance" after all.
