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Celebrating 40 years of Salfordians

Emma Fitzgerald
20/ 7/2006

MIDWIVES past and present got together to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Hope Hospital's maternity unit.

Staff who worked at the unit when it opened in 1966 attended a celebration event at the unit, which is threatened with closure under plans by Greater Manchester Strategic Health Authority.

The unit was officially opened on July 5, 1966 and the open day event gave babies born that year the chance to see their entry in the unit's birth register.

The event was open to people born at Hope, their parents and anyone thinking about having a baby at the Stott Lane hospital in the future.

Midwives were on hand to share information on how the unit has developed over the last 40 years and give organised tours of the unit so people could see the facilities in place today.

Former midwife Lettie Deakin, from Worsley, attended the event and is angered by the closure plans.

She said: "It will be dreadful if people from Salford have to travel to Bolton, Oldham or Manchester. A lot of people don't have transport and even if they do it's too far to travel and they often find it difficult to park when they get to these places.

"I don't know what they are thinking of because apart from the maternity unit there is also the neonatal intensive care unit and it will be awful if they go."

Lettie, whose two children and two grandchildren were all born at Hope, added: "The staff at the unit were very helpful to our daughter when she was having her babies. It will be very sad if the unit isn't allowed to stay."

More than 26,500 signatures were collected for the Advertiser's Hands Off Hope petition. Responses to the consultation are now being analysed and a final decision on the plans will be made in the autumn.