From W. H. Bromwich, Cowes:

In recent weeks we have heard about the plight of many families awaiting autism diagnosis by mainland providers.

Now we are learning about delays with cancer diagnosis and treatment when Islanders are referred to Southampton and Portsmouth.

Clearly, there is a serious problem with stretched mainland hospitals being able to provide key health services for Islanders. The quest to continually downsize St Mary’s in an attempt to make budgetary savings is a flawed model that is likely to endanger or shorten many Islanders’ lives.

The Island is particularly fortunate in having many caring and dedicated staff working in our NHS, they need to be supported and given the necessary resources to provide high quality care for our community, where and whenever possible here on the Island.

I believe St Mary’s deficit is a deliberately engineered crisis designed to pressurise the effective closure of many services.

It needs to be written off by the government, with new money invested to re-establish an Island hospital that is capable of meeting the basic health needs of our Island community and seasonal visitors, in a manner that doesn’t simply aspire to be ‘good’, but recreates what St Mary’s Hospital once was, ‘excellent’.