Welsh Conservatives pledge to restore baby services at Withybush General Hospital

The Welsh Conservatives will today (12/04/2016) announce a manifesto pledge to restore full-time paediatric and special baby care services at Withybush General Hospital in Haverfordwest.

In 2014, the Hywel Dda health board announced plans to close its specialist baby care services and later also confirmed its intention to downgrade the 24-hour paediatric care unit to a 12-hour service.

The decision drew the ire of thousands of protesters who feared that a centralisation of specialist baby services in West Wales to Glangwili Hospital in Carmarthen would put lives at risk – and branded the move as “foolish”.

Minutes taken from a health board meeting reveal that the decision to scale back these services was based on “staffing, training and finance” constraints.

Today’s pledge forms part of a broader commitment of the Welsh Conservatives to increase NHS expenditure in real terms, each and every year for the next five years, tackling the effect of Labour’s funding cuts and ensuring health services – such as Withybush – receives the investment it needs.

Welsh Conservatives also plan to develop a rural health specialism to ensure the NHS recognises the needs of rural communities and improves the right of access for patients across Wales.
Angela Burns, a Welsh Conservative Assembly Member candidate for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire, said:

“Under the Welsh Labour Government, hospital closures and service provision cutbacks continue to isolate Welsh communities, with the reconfiguration of services placing increasing strain on other hospitals.

“Nowhere is this more evident than in the decimation of services at Withybush Hospital and the resulting pressures upon Glangwilli – born out time and again by the numbers of my constituents who now have to go further east than Carmarthen for basic services.

“The 2016 OECD report recognised the need to shift care away from hospital settings and towards primary and community care. In effect, the Welsh Labour Government is adopting the opposite approach, and as such, is overburdening the centralised health system.

“Today Welsh Conservatives are pledging to reverse this. In just under a month’s time, voters will have the opportunity to save Withybush and re-establish its services to offer mothers and their children the robust care they deserve.”

Paul Davies, a Welsh Conservative Assembly Member candidate for Preseli Pembrokeshire, said:

“With a billion pounds pulled from frontline spending, Wales has seen the largest reductions in health spending of any of the UK nations as a consequence of the Welsh Labour Government failure to protect the NHS budget – and that’s being felt right across the country.

“Here in Pembrokeshire, communities across the county have been fighting to restore full-time paediatric and special baby care services at Withybush hospital and today I’m proud to say that Welsh Conservatives are promising to do just that, if elected to government in May.

“I’m pleased that our announcement today reinforces our commitment to delivering health services locally and reviving those key services for the people of Pembrokeshire – it’s nothing short of what the local communities deserve.”