HEREFORD County Hospital has today (Tues) lost another ward to norovirus – just 24 hours after calling itself clear of the bug.

This afternoon Wye Valley NHS Trust confirmed Redbrook ward had been closed due to diarrhoea symptoms amongst patients.

The cases are being treated as the initial stages of norovirus.

On Monday, the hospital was working with a full set of wards for the first in weeks.

Frome ward was re-opened after an intensive deep clean having been, then, the last still shut to norovirus.

Lugg ward re-opened last Thursday.

Patient pressures, complicated by the norovirus outbreak that saw wards shut and up to half of available beds lost, caused the trust to call an “internal incident” at the hospital for the second time in a month with admission numbers up by 16 per cent on the same time last year.

The closures of Lugg ward – for a second time – and Frome ward came just 24 hours after the trust had made the internal incident call.

By then, patients with norovirus symptoms were presenting at under pressure A&E and subsequently having to be admitted.

A number of staff were also off because of the bug.

The Hereford Times has reported how patient pressures saw back office staff at the hospital working on wards to help with non-clinical tasks like fetching, carrying and cleaning.

Over February 8 to 11, norovirus struck to shut Lugg Ward and Arrow Ward and closed Ross Community Hospital to admissions and transfers.

With up to four wards closed to admission at the outbreak’s height, patient flow through the hospital slowed down leading to poor performance and patient experience.