NHS opens community hospital for patients recovering from Covid-19

Liaison Workforce

The NHS has recently opened a new community hospital for patients recovering from the coronavirus. The hospital, which is based in Surrey, is the first of its kind in England and will provide three hundred beds for those recovering from Covid-19, as well as those rehabilitating from routine surgeries.

The community hospital has been named NHS Seacole, after the pioneering Jamaican-born nurse, Mary Seacole, who helped patients to recover from injuries sustained in the Crimean War in the 1850’s. It will provide additional capacity for nearby hospitals who need beds for patients requiring ongoing medical support during the Covid-19 pandemic.

NHS Chief Executive, Sir Simon Stevens, said: “As well as providing important care in its own right, this new service – by recalling the pioneering work of Mary Seacole – rightly pays tribute to our BAME nurses and other staff at the forefront of the extraordinary NHS response to this terrible covid19 pandemic.

“It also serves as a timely reminder that it is their contribution over the past seven decades that has been a foundation for the very success and continuation of the NHS itself. I fully expect that this will be just the first of a number of Seacole services that will now begin to be established across the country as the NHS moves through the peak of inpatient coronavirus care and the need for community health and rehabilitative services grows.”