OPERATIONS and procedures have been cancelled at the University Hospitals Dorset Trust as the hospitals cope with rising coronavirus admissions.

As reported, Dorset currently has more than 500 patients in hospital with coronavirus, more than three times higher than the first wave peak.

More than 400 are at either the Royal Bournemouth or Poole Hospital, part of the University Hospitals Dorset Trust.

And the chief medical officer of UHD said the hospitals have been working to free up capacity.

Dr Alyson O’Donnell said: “We were always planning for a sharp increase in Covid-19 patients in January.

“As a merged trust, our two acute hospitals are able to work together to share resources and to help each other out.

“We also have been working very closely with our community partners to help free up capacity for more patients by helping patients who are medically ready to leave the hospital and will be working with them to maximise the numbers of patients to be discharged.

“We have expanded our intensive care units, which means we have had to move into our operating theatres and also we have needed to pull staff across from other areas, which means we have very reluctantly had to cancel some operations and procedures.

“Obviously we are very pleased that we have been continuing to vaccinate our staff at our clinics at Poole and Bournemouth and the new centre at the BIC will be an enormous boost for helping get our communities vaccinated.

“However, as infection rates throughout BCP still remain high we expect the number of admissions to remain high.

“Our local residents have a really important role in helping to limit the spread of infection and the admissions that would follow. We urge people to continue following the national guideline and to remember the basics of hands, face, space.”

Sam Crowe, director of public health Dorset, added: “Alongside our weekly public data report, we continuously monitor all local and national data sources to understand our current situation and model future scenarios.

“Our local data currently shows that more than 500 people are now in hospital with Covid-19 across Dorset, compared to around 130 at the peak of the first wave.

“We know that a rise in case rates lead to a rise in hospitalisations.

“No one wants to be in a lockdown for the third time, but unfortunately this is the only choice we have to constrain coronavirus.

“Stopping social mixing is the best way we can collectively tackle the Covid-19 pandemic and do our bit to stop transmission levels rising.

“So please keep doing what you are doing and stay at home unless it’s for essential reasons. We need everyone to follow the rules, it is the only way that we will break transmission and bring our coronavirus cases down, reducing pressure on local NHS services.”