Discharge of Covid-positive hospital patients to care homes could have caused outbreaks, watchdog says

The discharge of hospital patients with coronavirus to care homes could have caused outbreaks, a watchdog says.

Families of residents who died say their fears have been confirmed by Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) findings.

The Post told last August how dozens of patients who had tested positive for Covid-19 were moved to care homes to clear hospital beds. Almost 2,800 care home residents have died during the pandemic.

A Public Health Scotland report into the transfers said it could not exclude a “moderate to large risk” of an outbreak at a care home in such circumstances, but added: “There is no statistical evidence that hospital discharges of any kind were associated with care home outbreaks.”

But Ed Humpherson, the UK’s director general for regulation at the OSR, said the report showed a “causal relationship between positivity and outbreak”.

Alan Wightman, whose mother Helen died of Covid-19 while a resident in a Fife care home, said: “Families who have lost loved ones will be saying: ‘I told you so’.”

The Scottish Government said: “There is no suggestion the PHS report is inaccurate or misleading.”