A hundred patients with the covid-19 coronavirus have died at hospitals run by the NHS trust serving Brighton and Hove.
The figures, released yesterday (Sunday 3 May), indicate that just one patient with the virus has died in the past 10 days – and that was a week ago.
Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals (BSUH) runs the Royal Sussex County Hospital and the Royal Alexandra Children’s Hospital, in Brighton, and the Princess Royal Hospital, in Haywards Heath.
The Royal Sussex operates not just as a district general hospital but also treats patients from a wider area for a number of conditions.
And one hospital insider said that some of those arriving with the coronavirus may already be seriously ill, to the extent that they need care even though they cannot be cured. And not everyone who died with the virus died because of it.
The neighbouring Western Sussex Hospitals, which has the same leadership as BSUH, has recorded 82 deaths. Western runs Worthing General Hospital as well as St Richard’s in Chichester.
Sussex Community Foundation Trust, which has its headquarters at Brighton General Hospital, has recorded 14 deaths.
The Brighton General is no longer used as a hospital although the trust employs community nurses and runs hospitals elsewhere in Sussex.
Another neighbouring NHS hospital trust, East Sussex Healthcare, has recorded 64 deaths. It runs hospitals in Eastbourne and Hastings.
Surrey and Sussex Healthcare Trust has recorded 202 deaths.
The number of new hospital deaths across Britain went up by 396 to 24,097, according to the latest figures announced yesterday.
The number of deaths in all settings – including care homes, hospices and in people’s own homes – went up by 315 to 28,446.
The two sets of figures are different because they are measured over different timescales, the government said.
The number of tests carried out in the most recent 24-hour period was 76,496, taking the total to 1,206,405 since the start of the pandemic earlier this year. The number of people tested was 56,397, with some of those having more than one test.
The number of people confirmed to have the virus now totalled 186,599, the government said, a rise of 4,339 over the day before’s figures.
The number of people confirmed to have the virus in Brighton and Hove was reported to be 381.
In West Sussex the number was 1,172 and in East Sussex it was 593, making a total of 2,146 across Sussex as a whole.
