Dear Editor - Recent breaking news told us of the biggest shake-up to hospital-based services seen in mid and west Wales for generations.
The plans indicate that some special acute care, including obstetrics, paediatrics and emergency surgery could be removed from Withybush and Prince Phillip Hospital, Llanelli. In compensation, there will be either an extension of these services at West Wales General Hospital or the development of a single new integrated hospital facility. This strategy disregards the geographical isolation of many patients, towns and villages across mid and west Wales. Every woman in a civilised society has the right to comprehensive care which should not involve long, distressing journeys which potentially endanger the life of mother and child. Any single acute hospital will be entirely dependent on effective road and air ambulance cover, but the Assembly Government budget does not provide enough to make effective ambulance provision a reality. Also, given the additional population the 1,000 proposed LNG jobs will attract, the removal of acute emergency resources at Withybush will only dangerously burden our already overstretched emergency services. I am therefore asking women concerned about these changes (and how they may affect their families) to contact me so that we may effectively lobby against these ill-thought out plans.
Lisa Francis AM Welsh Conservative Assembly Member for Mid and West Wales National Assembly for Wales Cardiff
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